
Copyright N". 



COPYRIGHT DEPOStK 



A FAM I LY 



HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, 



FROM THE 



DISCOVERY OF THE AMERICAN CONTINENT 



TO 



THE PRESENT TIME. 



BY 



BENSON J. LOSSING, LL.D., 

iVTBOB 07 "PICrrOBIAL FIELD-BOOK OF THE EEVOLUTION," OF THE "WAB OF 1812," AND 01 

" THE CrVIL WAS ; " •' HISTOEY OF THE UNITED STATES FOE SCHOOLS J " " UTES 

OF EMINENT AMEEI0AN3 ; " " HOME OF WASHINGTON," ETC., KTU 



ILLUSTRATED BY FOUR HUNDRED ENGRAVINGS, 



PUBLISHED BY 

HARTFORD, CONNECTICUT. 




1883. 



Copyright, 1875 and 1881, by 
BENSON J. LOSSING, LL.D. 






p" 



,s^ 



/ 



, yr 



^^^>^ 



PREFACE. 

This work Iiaa been prepared with great care, for the purpose of supply- 
ing a want long felt by the reading public, and especially by Heads of Fam- 
ilies. Every important event in the history of the United States, from the 
Aboriginal period to the present time, is presented in a concise, but perspic- 
uous and comprehensive manner, without giving those minute and often 
tedious details, which are valuable to the student, but irksome to the common 
reader. The History of our Republic is herein popularized, and adapted to 
the use of those who may not find leisure to peruse more extensive worka 
upon the subject. The materials have been drawn from the earlier, most 
elaborate, and most reliable historians and chroniclers of our continent. The 
work is constructed upon a new plan, which, it is believed, will be found to 
be the most acceptable yet offered to the public, for obtaining, with facility, 
and fixing in the memory, a knowledge of the great events of our truly won- 
derful history. And having visited a greater portion of the localities made 
memorable by important occurrences in our country, the writer claims, in 
that particular, an advantage over his predecessors in this special field, for 
he has been able to correct errors and give truthful impressions of things and 
events. An endeavor has also been made to show the cause of every import- 
ant event, and thus, by developing the philosophy of our history, to make it 
more attractive and instructive than a bald record of facts. And wherever 
the text appeared to need further elucidation, additional facts have been given 
in foot-notes. 

The arrangement of the work is new. It is in six Periods, each com- 
mencing where the history naturally divides into distinct epochs. The first 
Period exhibits a general view of the Ahoriginal race who occupied the con- 
tinent when the Europeans came. The second is a record of all the Discov^ 
eries and preparations for settlement, made by individuals and governments. 
The third delineates the progress of all the Settlements until colonial gov- 
ernments were formed. The fourth tells the story of these Colonies from 
their infancy to maturity, and illustrates the continual development of Dem- 
ocratic ideas and Republican tendencies which finally resulted in a political 
confederation. The fifth has a full account of the important events of the 
War for Independence, and the sixth gives a concise history of the Re- 
public from its formation to the present time. The Supplement contains 



VI PKEFACE. 

the Articles of Co?) federation and tlie ISTational Co?istitution. The former 
shows the final result of the efforts of the people of the Colonies, who had 
struggled together for general independence, to form a national organiza- 
tion, but which signally failed, because in that League of States the suprem- 
acy of each was recognized, and the vitality of unity, which is essential to 
the existence of a nation, was wanting. The National Constitutif.n is given 
in its original form, and with all of the amendments since adopted, accom- 
panied by explanatory notes. The Supplement also contains a brief outline 
History of the Progress of the Nation, in all its aspects, during the first 
one hundred years of the existence of our Republic. 

The system of concordance interwoven with the notes throughout the 
entire work, is of great importance to the reader. When a fact is named 
which bears a relation to another fact elsewhere recorded in the volume, a 
reference is made to the 2ycige where such fact is mentioned. A knowledge 
of this relationship of separate events is often essential to a clear view of 
the subject, and without this concordance, a great deal of time would be 
spent in searching for that relationship. "With the concordance the matter 
may be found in a moment. Favorable examples of the utility of this new 
feature may be foiind on page 289. If strict attention shall be given to 
these references, the whole subject will be presented to the mind of the 
reader in a comprehensive aspect of unity not to be obtained by any other 
method. 

The engravings are introduced not for the sole purpose of embellishing^ 
the volume, but to enhance Its utility as an instructor. Every picture is 
intended to illustrate a fact, not merely to beautify the page. Great care 
has been taken to secure accuracy in all the delineations of men and things, 
so that they may not convey false instruction. Geographical maps have 
been omitted, because they must necessarily be too small to be of essential 
service. History may be read for the purpose of obtaining general infor- 
mation on the subject, without maps, but it should never be studied without 
the aid of an accurate Atlas. 

The author has endeavored to make this work essentially a Family 
History, attractive and instructive ; and the Publishers have generously 
co-worked with him in producing a volume that may justly claim to be 
excellent in every particular. With these few observations concerning the 
general plan and merits of the Avork, it is presented to the public, with &%> 
entire willingness to have its reputation rest upon its own merits. 

B. J. L. 
The Ridge, Dover, N. Y., 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



STEEL PLATES. 



1. PoBTKiiT OF Washdigton Frontispit 

5. De Soto on the Misbissippi to face page 

3. Governor Caevee AND Massasoit " " 

4. Death OF Wolfe " " S 

6. Washington AT Kip's Bay " " S 

6. Jones boabdino iub "Sebapis". " " S 



1. Washington besignino his Commissiok to face page 15? 

8. Hull's Surrender " " 4iw 

9. Japanese Embassy " '• 512 

10. Grant AND Pemberton " " M6 

11. Faeragut IN THE Rigging OF THE Hartford.. " " ?1|> 

12. PORTBAIT OF ABEAHAM Ll.NCOLN " " 7'.!0 



ENGRAVINGS ON WOOD. 



. Sioux Indians 9 

:. Portrait of Red Jacket. 9 

. A Wigwam 13 

..Wampum 13 

i. Indian Hieroglyphics. 13 

'. Indian Weapons 14 

. Calumets 14 

. Indian Burial-Place 15 

. Indian Totum 15 

. Profile of Blacli Hawk 18 

. Uncas's Monument 21 

. Portrait of S. Kirkland 25 

. Southern Indians 30 

. Columbus before the Council 34 

. Portrait of Vespucci 34 

. Northman 34 

. Normiin Ship 35 

. Old Tower at Newport. 35 

. Portrait of Columbus 36 

. Portrait of Isabella 38 

. The Fleet of Columbus 39 

, B.mnerof the Expedition 40 

. Balboa 42 

. Portrait of De Soto 44 

. Portrait of Cabot 46 

, Portrait of Verazani 47 

. Cartier's Ship 48 

. Arms of France 48 

, French Nobleman, 1540 49 

. Raleigh's Expedition 53 

, Portrait of Raleigh . 55 

, Raleigh's Ships 55 

, English Gentleman, 1580 57 

, Portrait of Henry Hudson 59 

The Half-Moon 59 

, Building Jamestown 61 

, Portrait of Captain J. Smith 61 

. Portrait of Pocahontas 66 

Seal of New Netherland 73 

A Puritan 75 

TheMayflower 77 

Governor Carver's Chair 79 

, Portrait of Lord Baltimore 81 

Hooker's Emigr.ition... 83 

First Meeting-House in Connecticut 86 

Portrait of Roger Williams 90 

Portrait of William Penn 95 

, The Assembly House 97 

Oglethorpe, at Savannah 101 

Embarkation of the Pilgrims 104 

Portrait of Oglethorpe 104 

Church Tower at Jamestown 112 

First Colony Seal, Massachusetts 117 

Portrait of Jolin Winthrop 117 

First Money Coined in the United States 122 

Portraitof King Philip 124 

Palisaded Building 127 

Portrait of Captain Church 128 

, Portrait of Cotton Mather 133 

Williams's House 135 

Plan of the Siege of Louisburg 137 

Portrait of Peter Stuyvesant 142 

City of New York in 1664. 144 

Stuyvesant's Surrender . 145 

The Charter Oak 156 

Penn's House 162 

Plan of Charleston in 16S0 166 

Early New England House 176 



1660. 



Plan of Fort Du Quesne. 186 

Portrait of Braddoek 186 

Burial of Braddoek 187 

Plan of Fort Edward 190 

Portrait of Sir W. Johnson 190 

Plan of Fort William Henry 190 

Portrait of Abercrombie 191 

Plans of Forts at Oswego 192 

Block House 192 

Map of Lake George. 194 

Portrait of Lord Amherst 196 

Plan of Ticonderoga 196 

Ruins of Ticonderoga ^ 197 

Portraitof Lord Howe IS' 

Plan of Crown Point 200 

Plan of Fort Niagara 200 

General Wolfe 201 



, Military Operations at Quebec 2(i2 

, Monument to Wolfe and Montcalm 202' 

Patrick Henry before the Virginia .Assembly 2(IT 

Portrait of James Otis 2i)T 

Portraitof Benjamin West 210 

Pi.rtrait of David Rittenhouse 211 

Portraitof Patrick Henry 214 

A Stamp 2;5 

Portraitof Cadwallader Colden 216 

Portraitof William Pitt 21T 

Portrait of John Dickenson 2'.9i 

Portrait of Samuel Adams Syii 

Portrait of Lord North 21i4'- 

Faneuil Hall 22S 

Snake Device 226i 

Portrait of Cli.irles Thomson 227" 

Carpeutc's ll.ill 228; 



i:ittle. 



. Portrait oUmsviiL Warren 237' 

. Portrait of Philip Schuyler 239' 

. Plan of the Walls of Quebec 24i 

. Portrait of General Montgomery 242 

. Culpepper Flag S-1'1 

. Union FlaL' 2« 

Continental Monev 24i 

. Portrait of General Lee 248 

. Portraitof General Moultrie 249 

. State House, Philadelphia 5JC 

. Portrait of Benjamin Rush 251 

. Portrait of General Putnam 2;*:j 

. Plan ofthe Battle on Long Island 214 

. Plan of Fort Washington -JM 

, Retreat from Long Island 2;*,7 

. The Jersey Prison-Ship 269> 

. Plan of tlic Battle at Trenton 263j 

. Portraitof Robert Morris 264- 

. Portraitof Silas Deane 266. 

. Portrait of Benjamin Franklin 26r 

. Plan of the Battle at Princeton 269-' 

. Portrait of La Favette 273; 

. Plan of the Battle at ihe Brandy wine 27?. 

. Chevaux-de-Frise 'i14 

. Plan of the Battle at Germantown 275. 

. Portraitof General SU Clair. 276- 

, Portraitof Kosciuszko 27T 

. Portrait of Joseph Brant 278 

, Portrait of General Burgoyne 278 

. A Treaty 278 

. 3urgovne's Surrender 279 

. Operations at Bemis's Heights 281 

. Portrait of Francis Hupkinson 284 

. Encampment at Valley Forge 285 

, Portraitof Sir Henry Clinton 287 

. Plan of the Battle at Monmouth 288- 

, Portrait of Count D'Estaing 289- 

, P..rtrait of Baron Steuben 291 

, Portraitof General Lincoln 294 

, Plan of Stony Point 298. 

Portrait of General Wayne 298 

Portrait of Daniel Boone 299 

, Portrait of George R. Clarke 3li9 

Clarke's Expedition 301 

Portrait of General Sullivan 304 

Plan of the Siege of Savannah 305. 

Portrait of Count Pulaski 305. 

, Portraitof John Paul Jones 3oT 

A Gun-boat at Boston 30T; 

. P.Ttrait of Admiral Hopkins 31"-: 

, Cipher Alphabet... 3(>i)> 

, Portrait ot Governor Rutledge -. Xl* 

, Portraitof Commodore Whipple 310. 

, Plan of the Siege of Charleston. 313 

Portraitof David Ramsay 31 i.- 

, Portrait of General Gates 3141 

Portraitof General Sumter 315 

Plan of Battle at Sanders's Creek 315 

Portraitof Baron De Kalb 316 

Portrait of Colonel Tar eton. 318 

Portrait of General Marion 317 

Portraitof Lord Cornwallis 318 

. Marion's Encauipment on the Pedee. 321 

Portrait of GcTernor Trumbull 323 

Portrait of Benedict Arnold. S:'.') 

TheCaptors' Medal iSI 



I L L iCr 3 T R A T I X S . 



Portrait ofGeneralGreene 

Portrait of General Morgan 

Portrait of Colonel Washington 

Bjrtrait of Colonel Henry Lee 

Plan of the Battle at Guilford 

Plan of the Battle at Hobkirk's Hill 

Pt>rtrait of Rebecca Motte 

Plan of Fort Ninety-Six 

Portrait of General Pickens.. 

Portrait of Count de Rochanibeau 

Portrait of Count de Grasse 

Plan of the Siege of Yorktown 

Portrait of Benjamin Thompson 

Portrait of James Jackson 

Portrait of George Clinton 

Portraitof John Marshall 

Portrait of Genera I Mifilia., 

Order of the Cindnnati 

Portrait of Bishop C arroll 

Franklin before the Convention 

Portrait of Oliver Ellsworth. 

Portrait of Alexander Hamilton 

Portrait ofRufus Putnam 

Inauguration of Washington 

Portrait of Gouvemeur Morris 

Portrait of Washington 

Portrait of Robert R. Livingston 

Portrait of Tench Coxe • 

Portraitof General Knox 

Wayne's Defeat of the Indians 

Portrait of John Jay 

Portrait of Fisher Ames 

Portrait of John Adams 

Portrait of C. C. Pinckney 

Portrait of Martha Washington 

Portrait of Thomas Jeflferson 

Portrait of Commodore Bainbridge 

United States Frigate 

Portrait of Lieutenant Decatur 

Mohammedan Soldier 

Burning of the Philadelphia at Tripoli 

Portrait ofRufus King 

Portrait of Aaron Burr 

Portrait of Robert Fulton. 

Fulton's first Steamboat 

Portrait of William Pinkney 

A Felucca Gun-Boat 

Portraitof John Randolph 

Portrait of James Madison 

Portrait of General Dearborn 

Portrait of S. Van Rennsselaer 

Sloopof-War 

Portrait of Governor Shelby 

Plan of Fort Meigs 

Plan of Fort Sandusky 

MagorCroghan 

Perry on Lake Erie 

Portrait of Commodore Perry 

Portrait of General Pike 

Fort Niagara in 1813 

Portrait of Captain Lawrence 

Portrait of Commodore Porter 

Portrait of General Brown 

Map of the Niagara Frontier 

Portrait of Commodore Macdonough 

Plan of the Battle of New Orleans 

Portraitof W. C. C.Claiborne 

Jackson at New Orleans 

Portrait of James Monroe 

Capture ofPensacola 

Portrait of Edward Livingston 

Portrait of John Quincy Adams 

Portrait of Dewitt Clinton 

Portrait of John C. Calhoun 

Portrait of General Jackson 

Portraitof Robert Y. Hayne 

Portrait of Osceola 

Map of the Seat of the Seminole War . . . . 

Portrait of Martin Van Buren 

Portrait of William H. Harrison 

Portraitof John Tyler 

Portraitof James K. Polk 

Portraitof General Scott 

The Region of Taylor's Operations 

Portraitof John C. Fremont 

Plan of Intrenchments at Vera Cruz 

The Route of Scott's Army in Mexico 

Bombardment of vera Cruz 

Operations near Mexico 

General Scott entering the City of Mexico., 

Portraitof General Taylor 

Portrait of Henry Clay 

Portraitof .Millard Fillmore 

Portraitof Daniel Webster 

Portraitof Joseph Smith , 

Mormon Emigration 

Portrait of S. F. B. Morse 

Portrait of E. K. Kane 

Portrait of Franklin Pierce 

Portrait of Santa Anna 

An Ocean Steamship 

Crystal Palace, New York 

Portraitof James M. Mason 

Portraitof James Buchanan 

Portrait of John Slide 11 

South Carolina Institute 

"Wigwam" at Chicago 

Palmetto Cockade 

Portrait of Jefferson Davis 

Poitr.iit tjf Robert Anderson 



. Fort Sumter In 1861. ...•.• 

, The Confederate flag 

. Harper's Ferry in 1861 

, Portraitof Salmon P. Chase 



Portrait of R. E. : 

Ellsworth Zouave 565 

Arsenal at St, Louia. 566 

Portraitof S. Price. 5«S 

Portraitof Winfield Scott 663 

Ruinsof the Stone-bridge 569 

Defenses of Washington 57J 

Portrait of Leonidas Polk 57T 

Fort Hatteras S80 

Fort Pickens 5S1 



298. Portrait of S. F. Dupont. 



Portrait of W. S. Roseci 
Monument at Stone's River. 

Portrait of R. Semmes 

Portrait of J. C. Pembertoo. 

A Louisiana Swamp . 

Cave-Life in Vicksburg 

Corps Badges 

Portrait of J. Hooker, 

Ruins of Chancelloravilie. . . 

Portrait of G. G. Meade 

Scene near Gettysburg, 

Drafting ., 

Abatis 

Libby Prison. 

Pack Mules 

Portrait of G, H. Thomas.. . 

The Chattanooga. 

Pulpit Rock 

'Ridge. 



., 593 
.. 595 
.. 596 



683 

. Fort Lafayette..'. 566 

. Portrait of C, Wilkes, 588 

. Portraitof W.H. Seward. 688 

, Portraitof A. E. Bumside 589 

. Portrait of S. A. Curtis 591 

, Texas Ranger 

, Portraitof a W.Hal leek 

, ViewatFort Donelson 

, Portraitof Lewis Wallace 

. Island Number Ten 

. Portraitof U, S, Grant 

, Burning horses at Shiloh., 

, Portrait of Beauregard 

. A Mortar Boat, 

, Portrait of O, M. Mitchel 

, Colyer's Head-Quarters 

, Fort Pulaski breached 

, Portrait of D. D. Porter 

. Ram Manassas 

, The Levee at New Orleans, 

, Portrait of G. B, McClellan, 

. Monitor and Merrimack 

, Portrait of J, E. Johnston 

, Portraitof T. J. Jackson 

, View on the Chickahominy 

. Harrison Mansion 

, Thoroughfare Gap 

. Monument at Groveton 

. Portrait of Philip Kearney 

, Battle-Field of South Mountain 

, Antietam Battle-ground 

, Fredericksburg on fire 

. View at Nashville 

. Portrait of D. C. Buell 

. Graves at luka 



610 



673 



685 



694 



697 



Portrait of J. Longstreet, 

A Parrott Gutt 

Torpedo 

The Swamp Angel 

Fort de Russy 

New Era, 

Red River Dam 

Place where Sedgwick was killed 

Portrait of P. H. Sheridan 

Pontoon Bridge 

Belle Isle 

The Butler Medal 

View at Cedar Creek 

Portrait of W. T. Sherman B9» 

Kenesaw Mountain '00 

Portrait of J. B. Hood '00 

Sherman's Quarters in Atlanta "Oil 

Sherman's Quarters in Savannah 70S 

The Albemarle 'M 

Franklin Battle-ground '06 

Portraitof J. A. Winslow '0» 

Blockade-Runner. '09 

Portraitof C. L Vallandigham 'H 

Interior of Fort Fisher "* 

Interior of Fort SteaJman '1' 

Capitol at Richmond "* 

McLean's House '^9 

Portrait of A. Johnson '21 

Davis's Prison, Fortress Monroe 722 

The Capitol at Washington '31 

The Senate Chamber, in which President Johnson was tried. 733 

Portrait of Joseph R. Hawley 746 

Seal of Centennial Commission '4T 

Centennial Med.il 747 

Portrait ofRulherford B. Hayes 750 

Portrait of James A Garfield 755 

Portrait or Ch-sl^r A.Arthur 769 



HISTORY 

OF 

THE UNITED STATES. 




THE ABORIGINALS. 



CHAPTER I. 



RED JACKET. 



Every cultivated nation had its heroic 

age — a period when its first physical and 

moral conquests were achieved, and when 

fude society, with all its impurities, was fused and refined in the crucible of 

progress. When civilization first set up its standard as a permanent ensign, in 

the western hemiapliore, northward of the Bahamas and the great Gnlf and 



]0 THE ABORIGINALS. 

the contests for possession began between the wild Aboriginals, who thrust no 
Bpade into the soil, no sickle into ripe harvests, and those earnest delvers from 
the Old World, who came with the light of Christianity, to plant a new 
empire, and redeem the wilderness by cultivation — then commenced the heroic 
age of America. It ended when the work of the Revolution in the eighteenth 
century was accomplished — when the bond of vassalage to Great Britain Avas 
severed by her colonies, and when thirteen confederated States ratified a Fed- 
eral Constitution, and upon it laid the broad foundation of our Republic' 

Long anterior to the advent of Europeans in America, a native empire, 
. little inferior to old Rome in civilization, flourished in that region of our Con- 
tinent Avhich now forms the south-western portion of our Republic, and the 
adjoining States of Central America. The Aztec Empire, which reached the 
acme of its refinement during the reign of Montezuma, and crumbled into frag- 
ments beneath the heel of Cortez, when he dethroned and destroyed that mon- 
arch,' extended over the whole region from the Rio Grande to the Isthmus of 
Darien ; and when the Spaniards came, it was gradually pushing its conquests 
northward, where all was yet darkness and gloom. To human apprehension, 
this people, apparently allied by various ties to the wild nations of North 
America, appeared to be the most efficient instruments in the hands of Provi- 
dence, for spreading the light of dawning civilization over the whole Continent. 
Yet, they were not only denied this glorious privilege, but, by the very race 
which first attempted to plant the seeds of European society in Florida, and 
among the Mobilian tribes,^ and to shed the illumination of their dim Chris- 
tianity over the dreary region of the North, was their own bright light extin- 
guished. The Aztecs and their neighbors were beaten into the dust of 
debasement by the falchion blows of avarice and bigotry, and nothing remains 
to attest their superiority but the magnificent ruins of their cities and temples, 
and their colossal statuary, which has survived the fury of the Spanish icono- 
clast and the tooth of decay. They form, apparently, not the most insignificant 
atom of the chain of events which connects the history of the Aboriginal nations 
of America with that of our Republic. The position of the tribes of the 
North is different. From the beginning of European settlements, they have 
maintained, and do still maintain, an important relation to the white people. 

The first inhabitants of a country properly belong to the history of all sub- 
sequent occupants of the territory. The several nations of red or copper- 
colored people who occupied the present domain of the United States, when 
Europeans first came, form as necessary materials for a portion of the history 
of our Republic, as the Frenchmen* and Spaniards,' by whom parts of the 
territory Avere settled, and from whom they have been taken by conquest or 
purchase. 

The history of the Indian' tribes, previous to the formation of settlements 
among them, by Europeans/ is involved in an obscurity which is penetrated 

' Pnge :i60. ' Page 43 3 Page 29. < Paf^e IHi^ 

* Page 5i « Page 40. ^ Before the year 1G07. 



THE ABORIGINALS. 



11 



only by vague traditions and uncertain conjectures. Whence came they ? is a 
question yet unanswered by established facts. In the Old World, the monu- 
ments of an ancient people often record their history. In North America, 
such intelligible records are wanting. Within almost every State and Terri- 
tory remains of human skill and labor have been found,' which seem to attest 
the existence here of a civilized nation or nations, before the ancestors of our 
numerous Indian tribes became masters of the Continent. Some of these 
appear to give indisputable evidence of intercourse between the people of the 
Old World and those of America, centuries, perhaps, before the birth of Christ, 
and at periods soon afterward.^ The whole mass of testimony yet discovered 
does not prove that such intercourse was extensive ; that colonies from the 
eastern hemisphere ever made permanent settlements in America, or remained 
long enough to impress their character upon the country or the Aboriginals, if 
they existed ; or that a high degree of civilization had ever prevailed on our 
Continent. 

The origin of the Indian tribes is referred by some to the Phoenicians and 
other maritime nations, whose extensive voyages have been mentioned by 
ancient writers, and among whom tradition seemed to cherish memories of far- 
off lands beyond the sea, unknown to the earlier geographers. Others per- 
ceive evidences of their Egyptian or Hindoo parentage ; and others find their 
ancestors among the "lost tribes of Israel," who "took counsel to go forth 
into a further country where never mankind dwelt,"' and crossed from north- 
eastern Asia to our Continent, by Avay of the Aleutian Islands, or by Beh- 
ring's Straits." These various theories, and many others respecting settlement* 
of Europeans and Asiatics here, long before the time of Columbus, unsupported 
as they are by a sufficiency of acknowledged facts, have so little practical value 

' Remains of fortifications, similar in form to those of ancient European nations, have been 
discovered. An idol, composed of clay and gypsum, representing a man without arms, and in 
all respects resembling one found in Southern Russia, was dug up near Nashville, in Tennessee. 
Also fireplaces, of regular structure ; weapons and utensils of copper ; catacombs with nmmmies ; 
ornaments of silver, brass, and copper; walls of forts and cities, and many other things which only 
a people advanced in civilization could have made. The Aboriginals, themselves, have variou* 
traditions respecting their origin — each nation having its distinct records in the memory. Nearly 
all have traditional glimpses of a great and universal deluge; and some say their particular pro- 
genitor came in a bark canoe aft;er that terrible event. This belief, with modifications, was current 

mong most of the northern tribes, and was a recorded tradition of the half-civilized Azteas. 

he latter ascribed all their knowledge of the arts, and their religious ceremonies, to a white and 
1 'Carded mort;d who came among them; and when his mission was ended, was made immortal by^ 
ilie Great Spirit. 

2 A Roman coin was found in Missouri ; a Persian coin in Ohio ; a bit of silver in Genesee 
county. New York, with the year of our Lord, 600, engraved on it; split wood and ashes, thirty 
ioet below the surface of the earth, near Fredonia, New York; and near Montevideo, South. 
America, in a tomb, were found two ancient swords, a helmet and shield, with Greek inscriptions, 
showhig that they were made in the time of Alexander the Great, 330 years before Christ. Near 
Marietta, Ohio, a silver cup, finely gilded within, Avas found in an ancient mound. Traces of iron 
utensils, wholly reduced to rust, mirrors of isinglass, and glazed pottery, have also been discovered 
in these mounds. Tnese are evidences of the existence of a race far more civilized than the tribe* 
found by modern Europeans. 

3 2 Esdras, xiii. 40^5. 

* The people of north-eastern Asia, and on the north-west coast of America, have a near 
resemblance in person, customs, and languages ; and those of the Aleutian Islands present many 
of the characteristics of both. Ledyard said of the people of Eastern Siberia, " Universally and 
circumstantially they resemble the Aborigines of America," 



13 THE ABORIGINALS. 

for the student of our history, that we will not occupy space in giving a deline- 
ation of even their outlines. There are elaborately-written works specially 
devoted to this field of inquiry, and to those the curious reader is referred. 
The proper investigation of such subjects requires the aid of varied and exten- 
sive knowledge, and a far wider field for discussion than the pages of a volume 
like this. So we will leave the field of conjecture for the more useful and 
important domain of recorded history. 

The New World, dimly comprehended by Europeans, afibrded materials for 
wonderful narratives concerning its inhabitants and productions. The few 
natives who were found upon the seaboard, had all the characteristics common 
to the human race. The interior of the Continent was a deep mystery, and 
for a long time marvelous stories were related and believed of nations of giants 
and pigmies ; of people with only one eye, and that in the centre of the fore- 
head ; and of whole tribes Avho existed without eating. But when sober men 
penetrated the forests and became acquainted with the inhabitants, it was dis- 
covered that from the Gulf of Mexico to the country north of the chain of 
great lakes which divide the United States and the British possessions, the 
people were not remarkable in persons and qualities, and that a great similarity 
in manners and institutions prevailed over that whole extent of country. 

The Aboriginals spoke a great variety of dialects, but there existed not 
more than eight radically distinct languages among them all, from the Atlan- 
tic to the Mississippi, and westward to the Rocky Mountains, namely : Al- 
gonquin, Huron-Iroquois, Cherokee, Catawba, Uchee, Natchez, 
MoBiLiAN, and Dahcotah or Sioux. These occupied a region embraced 
within about twenty-four degrees of latitude and almost forty degrees of longi- 
tude, and covering a greater portion of the breadth of the north temperate 
zone. 

All the nations and tribes were similar in physical character, moral senti- 
ment, social and political organization, and religious belief. They were all of 
a copper color; were tall, straight, and well-proportioned; their eyes black 
and expressive; their hair black, long, coarse, and perfectly straight; their 
constitutions vigorous, and their powers of endurance remarkable. Bodily 
deformity was almost unknown, and few diseases prevailed. They were indo- 
lent, taciturn, and unsocial ; brave, and sometimes generous in war ; unflinch- 
ing under torture ; revengeful, treacherous, and morose when injured or 
offended ; not always grateful for favors ; grave and sagacious in council ; often 
eloquent in speech ; sometimes warm and constant in friendship, and occasion- 
ally courteous and polite. 

The men were employed in war, hunting and fishing. The women per- 
formed all menial services. In hunting and fishing the men were assiduous 
and very skillful. They carried the knowledge of woodcraft to the highest 
degree of perfection; and the slightest indication, such as the breaking of a 
twig, or the bending of grass, was often sufficient to form a clew to the pathway 
of an enemy or of game. The women bore all burdens during journeys ; 
spread the tents ; prepared food ; dressed skins for clothing ; wove mats for 



THE acorigixal; 



15 




beds, made of the bark of trees and the skins of animals : and planted and 
gathered the scanty crops of corn, beans, peas, potatoes, 
melons, and tobacco. These constituted the chief agri- 
cultural productions of the Aboriginals, under the most 
favorable circumstances. In these labors the men never 
engaged; thej only manufactured their implements of 
■war. Their wigwams, or houses, were rude huts, made 
of poles covered with mats, skins, or bark of trees ; and 
all of their domestic arrangements were very simple. 

And simple, too, were their implements of labor. They were made of stones, 
shells, and bones, with which they prepared their food, made their clothing and 
habitations, and tilled their lands. Their food consisted of a few vegetables, 
and the meat of the deer, buffalo, and bear, generally roasted upon the 
points of sticks; sometimes boiled in water heated by hot 
stones, and always eaten without salt. Their dress in summer 
was a slight covering around the loins. In winter they were 
clad in the skins of wild beasts,' often profusely ornamented 
with the claws of the bear, the horns of the buffalo, the feathers 
of birds, and the bones of fishes. Their faces were often tat- 
tooed, and generally painted with bright colors in hideous 
devices. Their money was little tubes made of shells, fastened 
upon belts or strung in chains, and called wampum^ It was 
used in traffic, in treaties, and as a token of friendship or alliance. Wampum 
belts constituted records of public transactions in the hands of a chief. 

There was no written language in all the 
New World, except rude hieroglyphics, or 
picture writings. The history of the 
nations, consisting of the records of warlike 
achievements, treaties of alliance, and 
deeds of great men, was, in the form of 
traditions, carefully handed down from 
father to son, especially from chief to chief 





<=?25- 



INDIAN HIEROGLYPHICS. 



Children were taught the simple 



' They usuaUy wore the skins of the deer, the elk, and the bear, prepared with the fur 
on ; sometimes of the buffalo also. 

' "Wampum is yet in use, as money, among some of the Western tribes, and is manufactured, 
we believe, as an article of commerce on the sea-shore of one of the counties of New Jersey. It is 
made of the clear parts of the common clam-shelL This part being split off, a hole is drilled in it, 
and the form, which is that of the bead now known as the hugh^ is produced by friction. They are 
about half an inch long, generally disposed in alternate layers of white and bluish black, and 
valued, when they become a circulating medium, at about two cents for three of the black beads, 
or six of the white. They were strung in parcels to represent a penny, three pence, a shilling, 
and five shilHngs, of white ; and double that amount in black. A fathom of white was worth 
•bout two dollars and a hal^ and black about five dollars. They were of less value at the time of 
our war for independence. The engraving shows a part of a string and a leU of wampum. 

3 This is part of a record of a war expedition. The figures on the right and left — one with a 
gun and the other vrith a hatchet — denote prisoners taken by a warrior. The one without a head, 
and holding a bow and arrow, denotes that one was killed ; and the figure with a shaded part 
below the cross indicates a female prisoner. Then he goes in a war canoe, with nine companions, 
denoted by the paddles, after which a council is held by the chiefs of the Bear and Turtle tribes, 
indicated by rude figures of these animals on each side of a fire. 



THE ABORIGINALS. 




INDIAN WEAPONS.^ 




jirts practiced among them, such as making wampum, constructing bows, 
arrows, and spears, preparing matting and skins for domestic use, and fashion- 
ing rude personal ornaments. 

Individual and national pride prevailed among the Aboriginals. They 
were ambitious of distinction, and therefore war was the chief vocation, as wo 
have said, of the men.' They generally went forth in parties of about forty 
bowmen. Sometimes a half-dozen, like knights- 
errant," went out upon the war-path to seek renown in 
combat. Their weapons were bows and arrows, hatch- 
ets (tomahawks) of stone, and scalping-knives of bone. 
Soon after they became acquainted with the Euro- 
peans, they procured knives and hatchets made of 
iron, and this was a great advance in the 
increase of their power. Some wore 
shields of bark ; others wore skin dresses 
for protection. They were skillful in stratagem, and seldom met 
an enemy in open fight. Ambush and secret attack were their 
favorite methods of gaining an advantage over an enemy. Their 
close personal encounters were fierce and bloody. They made 
prisoners, and tortured them, and the scalps* of enemies were 
their trophies of war. Peace was arranged by sachems' in council ; 
and each smoking the same " pipe of peace," called calumet,' was calumets. 
a solemn pledge of fidelity to the contract. 

With the Indians, as with many oriental nations, women were regarded aa 
inferior beings. They were degraded to the condition of abject slaves, and they 
never engaged with the men in their amusements of leaping, dancing, target- 
shooting, ball-playing, and games of cha,nce. They were allowed as spectators, 
with their children, at war-dances around fires, when the men recited the feats 
of their ancestors and of themselves. Marriage, among them, was only a tem- 
porary contract — a sort of purchase — the father receiving presents from the 

' It was offensive to a chief or warrior to ask him his name, because it imphed that his brave 
deeds were unknown. Red Jacket, the great Seneca chief (whose portrait is at the head of this 
chapter), was asked his name in court, in compliance with a legal form. He was very indignant, 
and replied, " Look at the papers which the white people keep the most carefully" — (land cession 
treaties) — " they will tell you who I am." Red Jacket was born near Geneva, New York, about 
1750, and died in 1830. He was the last great chief of the Senecas. For a biographical sketch of 
him, see Lossing's " Eminent Americans." 

" Knights-errant of Europe, six hundred years ago, were men clothed in metal armor, who 
went from country to country, to win fame by personal combats with other knights. They also 
engaged in wars. For about three hundred years, knights-errant and their exploits formed the 
chief amusement of the courts of Europe. It is curious to trace the connection of the spirit of 
knighthood, as exhibited by the one hundred and thirty-five orders that have existed, at 
various times, in the Old World, with some of the customs of the rude Aboriginals of North 
America 

3 a, bow and arrow; b, a war club; c, an iron tomahawk; d, a stone one; e, a scalping- 
knife. 

* They seized an enemy by the hair, and by a skillful use of the knife, cut and tore from the 
top of the head a large portion of the skin. 

' Sachems were the civil heads of nations or tribes ; chiefs were military leadera 

* Tobacco was in general use among the Indians for smoking, when the white men came. The 
more filthy practice of chewing it was invented by the white people. The calumet was made of 
pipe-clay, and was often ornamented with feathers. 



THE ABORIGINALS. 15 

husband, in exchange for the daughter, who, generally, after being fondled and 
favored for a few months, was debased to the condition of a domestic servant, at 
best. The men had the right to take wives and dismiss them at pleasure ; and, 
though polygamy was not very common, except among the chiefs, it was not 
objectionable. Every Indian might have as many wives as he could purchase 
and maintain. The husband might put his wife to death if she proved unfaithful 
to him. The affections were ruled by custom, and those decorous endearments 
and attentions toward woman, which give a charm to civilized society, were 
wholly unknown among the Indians ; yet the sentiment of conjugal love was 
not always wanting, and attachments for life were frequent. There was no 
society to call for woman's refining qualities to give it beauty, for they had but 
few local attachments, except for the burial-places of their dead. 

From the frozen North to the tropical South, their funeral ceremonies 
and methods of burial were similar. They laid their dead, wrapped in skins, 
upon sticks, in the bottom of a shallow pit, or placed 
them in a sitting posture, or occasionally folded them 
in skins, and laid them upon high scaffolds, out of the 
reach of wild beasts. Their arms, utensils, paints, 
and food, were buried with them, to be used on their 
long journey to the spirit-land. By this custom, the 
doctrine of the immortality of the soul was clearly and 
forcibly taught, not as distinctively spiritual, but as 
possessing the two-fold nature of matter and spirit. Over their graves they 
raised mounds, and planted beautiful wild-flowers upon them. The Algon- 
quins, especially, always lighted the symbolical funeral pyre, for several nights, 
upon the grave, that the soul might perceive and enjoy the respect paid to the 
body. Relatives uttered piercing cries and great lamentations during the 
burial, and they continued mourning many days. 

Like that of the earlier nations of the world, their religion was simple, with- 
out many ceremonies, and was universally embraced. They had no infidels 
among them. The duality of God is the most ancient tenet of Indian faith — 
a prominent tenet, it will be observed, in the belief of all of the more advanced 
oriental nations of antiquity. They believed in the existence of two Great 
Spirits : the one eminently great was the Good Spirit,' and the inferior was an 
Evil one. They also deified the sun, moon, stars, meteors, fire, water, thun- 
der, wind, and every thing which they held to be superior to themselves, but 




BURIAL-PLACE. 



' They believed every animal to have had a great original, or father. The first buffalo, the first 
hear, the first beaver, the first eagle, etc., was the Manitou of the whole race of the different crea- 
tures. They chose some one of these originals as their special Manitou, or guardian, and hence 
arose the custom of having the figure of some animal for the arms or symbol 
of a tribe, called totum. For example, each of the Five Nations (see page 12) 
was divided into several tribes, designated The "Wolf, The Bear, The Turtle, 
etc., and their respective toiums were rude representations of these animals. 
When they signed treaties with the white people, they sometimes sketched 
outlines of their totmns. The annexed cut represents the totum of Teyenda- 
gages, of the Turtle tribe of the Mohawk nation, as affixed by him to a deed. 
It would be a curious and pleasant ta.sk to trace tlie intimate connection of 
tWs totemic system with the use of symbolical signet-rings, and other seals of antiquity, and, by suc- 
cession, the heraldic devices of modern times. 



^ 



16 THE ABORIGINALS. 

thej never exalted their heroes or prophets above the sphere of humanity. 
They also adored ^ invisible, great Master of life, in different forms, which 
they called Manitou, and made it a sort of tutelar deity. They had vague 
ideas of the doctrine of atonement for sins, and made propitiatory sacrifices with 
great solemnity. All of them had dim traditions of the creation, and of a great 
deluge which covered the earth. Each nation, as we haVe observed, had crude 
notions, drawn from tradition, of their own distinct origin, and all agreed that 
their ancestors came from the North. 

It can hardly be said that the Indians had any true government. It was a 
mixture of the patriarchal and despotic. Public opinion and common usage 
were the only laws of the Indian.' All political power was vested in a sachem 
or chief, who was sometimes an hereditary monarch, but frequently owed his 
elevation to his own merits as a warrior or orator. While in power, he was 
absolute in the execution of enterprises, if the tribe confided in his wisdom. 
Public opinion, alone, sustained him. It elevated him, and it might depose 
him. The office of chief was often hereditary, and its duties were sometimes exer- 
cised even by women. Unlike the system of lineal descent which prevails in 
the Old World, the heir to the Indian throne of power was not the chief's own 
son, but the son of his sister. This usage was found to be universal through- 
out the continent. Yet the accident of birth was of little moment. If the 
recipient of the honor was not worthy of it, the tifle might remain, but the m- 
Jluence passed into other hands. This rule might be followed, with benefit, by 
civilized communities. Every measure of importance was matured in council, 
which was composed of the elders, with the sachem as umpire. His decision 
was final, and wherever he led, the whole tribe followed. The utmost decorum 
prevailed in the public assemblies, and a speaker was always listened to with 
respectful silence. 

We have thus briefly sketched the general character of the inhabitants of 
the territory of the United States, when discovered by Europeans. Although 
inferior in intellectual cultivation and approaches to the arts of civilization, to 
the native inhabitants of Mexico^ and South America, and to a race which 
evidently occupied the continent before them, they possessed greater personal 
manliness and vigor than the more southern ones discovered by the Spaniards. 
They were almost all wanderers, and roamed over the vast solitudes of a fertile 
continent, free as the air, and unmindful of the wealth in the soil under their 
feet. The great garden of the western world needed tillers, and white men 
came. They have thoroughly changed the condition of the land and the people. 
The light of civilization has revealed, and industry has developed, vast treas- 
ures in the soil, while before its radiance the Aboriginals are rapidly melting 
-like snow in the sunbeams. A few generations will pass, and no representa- 
tive of the North American Indian will remain upon the earth. 

• It was said of McGillivray, the half-breed emperor of the Creeks, who died in 1793, that, not- 
withstanding he called himself "King of kings," and was idolized by his people, "he could neither 
restrain the meanest fellow of his nation from the commission of a crime, nor punish him after bo 
bad committed it. He might persuade, or advise — all the good an Indian king or chief can do. ■> 

a Page A?.. 



THE ALGONQUINS. 17 

CHAPTER II. 

THE ALGONQUINS. 

The first tribes of Indians, discovered by the French in Canada,' were m- 
habitants of the vicinity of Quebec, and the adventurers called them Mon- 
tagners, or Mountain Indians, from a range of high hills westward of that city. 
Ascending the St. Lawrence, they found a numerous tribe on the Ottawa 
River, who spoke an entirely different dialect, if not a distinct language. 
These they called Algonquins, and this name Avas afterward applied to that 
great collection of tribes north and south of Lakes Erie and Ontario, who spoke 
dialects of the same language. They inhabited the territory now included in 
all of Canada, New England, a part of New York and Pennsylvania, the 
States of New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia, eastern North Car- 
olina above Cape Fear, a large portion of Kentucky and Tennessee, and all north 
and west of these States, eastward of the Mississippi. 

The Algonquin nation was composed of several powerful tribes, the most 
important of which were the Knisteneaux and Athapascas, in the far north, the 
Ottawas, Chippewas, Sacs and Foxes, Menomonees, Miamies, Piankeshaws, 
Pottowatomies, Kickapoos, Illinois, Shawnees, Powhatans, Corees, Nanticokes, 
Lenni-Lenapes, or Delawares, Mohegans, the New England Indians, and the 
Abenakes. There were smaller, independent tribes, the principal of which 
were the Susquehannocks, on the Susquehanna in Pennsylvania ; the Manna- 
hoacks, in the hill country between the York and Potomac Rivers, and the 
Monocans, on the head waters of the James River in Virginia. All of these 
tribes were divided into cantons or clans, sometunes so small as to aflford only a, 
war party of forty bowmen. 

The Knisteneaux yet [1883] inhabit a domain extending across the con- 
tinent from Labrador to the Rocky Mountains, and are the hereditary ene- 
mies of the Esquimaux, their neighbors of the Polar Circle. The Athapascas 
inhabit a belt of country from Churchill's River and Hudson's Bay to within a 
hundred miles of the Pacific coast, and combine a large number of tribes who 
speak a similar language. They, too, are the enemies of the Esquimaux. The 
extensive domain occupied by these tribes and the Esquimaux, is claimed by 
the British, and is under the control of the Hudson's Bay Company. The 
orginal land of the Ottawas was on the west side of Lake Huron, but they 
were seated upon the river in Canada bearing their name, when the French dis- 
covered them. They claimed sovereignty over that region, and exacted tribute 
from those who passed to or from the domain of the Hurons.^ They assisted 



' Page 48. 

2 Between the Ottawas and Hurons, was a tribe called Missi8saguies, who appear to have left the 
Algonquins, and joined the Five Nations, south of Lake Ontario. Remnants of this tribe are 
.«till found in Canada. 

o 



IS THE ABORIGINALS. 

the latter in a war with the Five Nations' in 1650, and suffered much. The- 
Hurons were almost destroyed, and the Ottawas were much reduced in num- 
bers. Some of them, with the Huron remnant, joined the Chippewas, and, 
finally, the Avhole tribe returned to their ancient seat [1680] in the northern 
part of the Michigan peninsula. Under their great chief, Pontiac, they were 
confederated with several other Algonquin tribes of the north-west, in an 
attempt to exterminate the white people, in 1763.'- Within a fortnight, in the 
summer of that year, they took possession of all the English garrisons and 
trading posts in the West, except Detroit, Niagara, ^ and Fort Pitt.^ Peace was 
restored in 1764-5, the confederation was dissolved, and Pontiac took up his. 
abode with the Illinois, where he was murdered.^ " This murder," says Nicol- 
let, "which roused the vengeance of all the Indian tribes friendly to Pontiac, 
brought about the successive wars, and almost extermination of the Illinois na- 
tion." His broken nation sought refuge with the French, and their des«endantg 
may yet [1883] be found in Canada. 

Those two once powerful tribes, the Chippewas and Pottawatomies, were 
closely allied by language and friendship. The former were on the southern 
shores of Lake Superior ; the latter occupied the islands and main land on the 
western shores of Green Bay, when first discovered by the French in 1761. 
These afterward seated themselves on the southern shore of Lake Michigan 
[1701], where they remained until removed, by treaty, to lands upon the Little 
Osage River, westward of IVfissomn. They are now [1883] the most numerous 
of all the remnants of the Algoxqui:n" tribes. The Chippewas and the Sioux, 
west of the Mississippi, were, for a long time, their deadly enemies. 

The Sacs and Foxes are really one tribe. They were first discovered by the 
French at the southern extremity of Green Bay, in 1680. In 1712 the French 
garrison of twenty men at Detroit,'^' was attacked by the Foxes. The French 
repulsed them, with the aid of the Ottawas, and almost destroyed the assailants. 
They joined the Kickapoos in 1722, in driving the Illinois from their lands on 
the river of that name. The Illinois took refuge with the French, and the 
Kickapoos remained on their lands until 1819, when they went 
to the west bank of the Missouri in the vicinity of Fort Leav- 
enworth. The Sacs and Foxes sold their lands to the United 
States in 1830. Black Hawk, a Sac chief, who, with his 
people, joined the English in our second war with Great Brit- 
ain,^ demurred, and commenced hostilities in 1832.^ The In- 
dians were defeated, and Black Hawk,^ with many of his war- 

1 '. BLACK HAWK. 

riors, were made prisoners. 

Among the very few Indian tribes who have remained upon their ancient 

' Chapter HI, p 23. " Page 205. 3 Page 200. < Page 198. 

5 He was buried on the site of the city of St. Louis, in Missouri. " Neither mound nor tablet,' 
■ays Parkman, " marked the burial-place of Pontiac. For a mausoleum, a city has risen above the 
forest hero, and the race whom he hated with such burning rancor, trample with unceasing foot- 
steps over his forgotten grave." 

6 Page 180. 7 Page 409. 8 Page 463. 

9 This picture is from a plaster-cast of the face of Black Hawk, taken when he was a prisoner in. 
New York, in 1832. See page 463. 




THE ALGONQUINS. 19 

territory, during all the vicissitudes of their race, are the Menomonees, who 
were discovered by the French, upon the shores of Green Bay, in 1699. They 
yet [1883] occupy a portion of their ancient territory, while their southern 
neighbors and friends, the Winnebagoes, have gone westward of the Mississippi.' 

The MiAMiES and Piankeshaws inhabited that portion of Ohio lying be- 
tween the Maumee River of Lake Erie, and the ridge which separates the head 
waters of the Wabash from the Kaskaskias. They were called Twightwees by 
the Five Nations, and English. Of all the Western tribes, these have ever 
been the most active enemies of the United States.'^ They have ceded their 
lands, and are now [1883] far beyond the Mississippi. 

The Illinois formed a numerous tribe, twelve thousand strong, when dis- 
covered by the French. They were seated upon the Illinois River, and consisted 
of a confederation of five families, namely, Kaskaskias, Cahokias, Tamaronas, 
Michigamias, and Peorias. Weakened by internal feuds, the confederacy was 
reduced to a handful, by their hostile neighbors. They ceded their lands in 
1818, when they numbered only three hundred souls. A yet smaller remnant 
are now [1883] upon lands west of the Mississippi. It can not properly be said 
that they have a tribal existence. They are among the many extinct commun- 
ities of our continent. 

The once powerfid Shawnoese occupied a vast region west of the Alleghan- 
ies,' and their great council-house was in the basin of the Cumberland River. 
At about the time when the English first landed at Jamestown* [1607], they 
were driven from their country by more southern tribes. Some crossed the 
Oh^, and settled on the Sciota, near the present Chilicothe ; others wandered 
eastward into Pennsylvania. The Ohio division joined the Eries and Andastes 
against the Five Nations in 1672, Suffering defeat, the Shawuoese fled to 
the country of the Catawbas, but were soon driven out, and found shelter with 
the Creeks.5 They finally returned to Ohio, and being joined by their Penn- 
sylvania brethren, they formed an alliance with the French against the En- 
glish, and were among the most active allies with the former, during the long 
contest known in America as the French and Indian War. They continued 
hostilities, in connection with the Delawares, even after the conquest of the 
Canadas by the English.^ They were subdued by Boquet in 1763,^ and again 
by Virginians, at Point Pleasant, at the mouth of the Great Kenawha, in 1774.^ 
They aided the British durmg the Revolution, and continued to annoy the 
Americans until 1795, when permanent peace was established.^ They were 
the enemies of the Americans during their second war with Great Britain, a 
part of them fighting with the renowned Tecumtha. Now [1883] they are but 

1 The "Winnebagoes are the most dissolute of all the Indian remnants. In August, 1853, a treaty 
was made with them to occupy the beautiful country above St. Paul, westward of the Mississippi, 
between the Crow and Clear Water Rivers. 

* Page 408. 

^ The Alleghany or Appalachian Mountains extend from the Catskills, in the State of New York, 
in a south-west direction, to Georgia and Alabama, and have been called " the backbone of the 
country." Some geographers extend them to the White Mountains of New Hampshire. 

* Page 64. '' Page 30. ' Page 203. 
^ Note 1, page 205. * Note 4, page 237. ' Page 374 



20 THE ABORIGINALS. 

a miserable remnant, and occupy lands south of the Kansas Rive?'. The road 
from Fort Independence' to Santa Fe passes through their territory. - 

The PowHATANS constituted a confederacy of more than twenty tribes, in- 
cludino- the Accohannocks and Accomacs, on the eastern shore of the Chesa- 
peake Bay. Powhatan (the father of Pocahontas^), was the chief sachem or 
emperor of the confederacy, when the English first appeared upon the James 
River, in 1607. He had arisen, by the force of his own genius, from the po- 
sition of a petty chief to that of supreme ruler of a great confederacy. He gov- 
erned despotically, for no man in his nation could approach him in genuine 
ability as a leader and counselor. His court exhibited much barbaric state. 
Through fear of the English, and a selfish policy, he and his people remained 
nominally friendly to the white intruders during his lifetime, but after his 
death, they made two attempts [1622, 1644] to exterminate the Englisii. The 
Powhatans w^ere subjugated in 1644,^ and from that time they gradually di- 
minished in numbers and importance. Of all that great confederacy in Lower 
Virginia, it is believed that not one representative on earth remains, or that 
one tongue speaks their dialect. 

On the Atlantic coast, south of the Powhatans, were the Corees, Cheraws, 
and other small tribes, occupying the land once inhabited by the powerful Hat- 
teras Indians.* They were allies of the Tuscaroras in 1711, in an attack upon 
the English,*^ suffered defeat, and have now disappeared from the earth. Their 
dialect also is forgotten. 

Upon the great peninsula between the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays, were 
the Nanticokes. They were early made vassals, and finally allies, on com- 
pulsion, of the Five Nations. They left their ancient domain in 1710, occu- 
pied lands upon tlie Susquehanna, in Pennsylvania, until the Revolutionary 
War commenced, when they crossed the Alleghanies, and joined the British in 
the west. They are now [1883] scattered among many tribes. 

The Original People, ^ as the Lenni-Lenapes (who are frequently called Del- 

■ United States fort on the Missouri. Santa Fe is in New Mexico, 765 miles south-west of Fort 
Independence. 

2 One of the most eminent of the Shawnoe chiefs, was Cornstalk, who was generally friendly to 
the Americans, and was always ready to assist in negotiating an honorable peace between them and 
his own people. But he cordially united with Logan, the Mmgo chiefj against the white people in 
1774; and during the same battle at Point Pleasant, liis voice, stentorian in volmne, was frequently 
heard, calling to his men, "Be strong 1 be strong!" He made his warriors fight without wavering, 
and actually sunk his tomahawk deep into the head of one who endeavored to escape. He was 
murdered by some exasperated soldiers at Point Pleasant. "When he perceived their intent, he 
cahnly said to his-son, who had just joined him, " My son, the Great Spirit has seen fit tliat we 
sfcould die together, and has sent you hither for that purpose. It is His will ; let us submit." 
Tinning to the soldiers, he received the fatal bullets, and his son, who was sitting near bun, was 
shot at the same time. The celebrated Tecumtha — meaning a tiger crouching for his prey — who 
endeavored to confederate all the Western tribes in opposition to the white people, was also a 
Shawnoe chief See page 408. 

^ Page 66. * Page 108. 

5 This tribe numbered about three thousand warriors when Raleigh's expedition landed on 
Roanoke Island in 1584; when the English made permanent settlements in that vicinity, eighty 
years later, they were reduced to about fifteen bowmen. « Page 168. 

T This name has been applied to the whole Algonquin nation. The Lenni-Lenapes claimed to 
have come from beyond the Mississippi, conquering a more civilized people on the way, who 
inhabited the great valleys beyond the Alleghany Momitains. 



THE ALGONQUIN'S. 21 

awares) named themselves, comprised two powerful nations, namelj, the Minsi 
and the Delawares proper. The former occupied the northern part of New 
jersey, and a portion of Pennsylvania, and the latter inhabited lower New Jer~ 
sej, the banks of the Delaware below Trenton, and the whole valley of the 
Schuylkill. The Five Nations subjugated them in 1650. and brought them 
under degrading vassalage. They gradually retreated westward before the tide 
of civilization, and finally a portion of them crossed the Alleghanies, and settled 
in the land of the Hurons/ on the Muskingum, in Ohio. Those who remained 
in Pennsylvania joined the Shawnoese/^ and aided the French against the En- 
glish, during the French and Indian Vfar.^ In 1768, they all went over the 
mountains, and the great body of them became friends of the British durino^ the 
Revolution. They Avere at the head of the confederacy of Western tribes who 
were o.'ushed by Wayne in 1794,-" and the following year they ceded all their 
lands on the Muskingum, and seated themselves near the Wabash. In 1819, 
they ceded those lands also, and the remnant now [1883] occupy a territory 
north of the Kansas River, near its mouth. 

The MoHEGANS were a distinct tribe, on the Hudson River, but the name 
was given to the several independent tribes who inhabited Long Island, and tlie 
country between the Lenni-Lenapes and the New England Indians.^ Of this 
family, the Pequods," inhabiting eastern Connecticut, on the shores of Lono- 
Island Sound, were the most powerful. They exercised authority over the 
Montauks and twelve other tribes upon Long Island. Their power was broken 
by the revolt of Uncas against his chief, Sassacus,'' a short time before tlie ap- 
pearance of the white people. The Manhattans were seated upon the Hudson, 
in lower Westchester, and sold Manhattan Island, whereon New York now 
stands, to the Dutch.^ The latter had frequent conflicts with these and other 
River Indians.' The Dutch were generally conquerors. The MohaAvks, one 
of the Five Nations," were pressing hard upon them, at the same time, and 
several of the Mohegan tribes were reduced to the condition of vassals of that 
confederacy. Peace was effected, in 1665, by the English governor at New 
York. In the mean while, the English and Narragansets had 
smitten the Pequods," and the remaining independent Mohe- 
gans, reduced to a handful, finally took up their abode upon the 
west bank of the Thames, five miles below Norwich,'^ at a place 
still known as Mohegan Plain. Their burial-place was at Nor- 
wich, and there a granite monument rests upon the grave of 
Uncas. The tribe is now almost extinct — " the last of the Mo- 

TTKOAS' MOKVMENT. J^J^^^^,, ^-JJ ^^^^ ^^^^^ ^-^J^ J^-^ ^^^^^^^^^^ 

» Page 23. » Page 19. » Fourth Period, Chap. XII. " Pa-e :-)74. 

^ Page 22. « Page 86. "• Page 87. « Paoe 139. 

" Page 140. " Page 23. " Page 87. " Note 4, page 340. 

" The last known lineal descendant of Uncas, named Mazeon, was buried in the Indian cemetery, 
at Norwich, in 1827, when the remnant of the Mohegan trllie, then numbering about sixty, were 
present, and partook of a cold collation prepared for them hj a lady of that city. The most noted 
leaders among the New England Indians known to history, are Massasoit, the father of the re- 
nowned King Philip, Caunbitant, a very distinguished captain; Hobomok; Canonicus; Mianto- 
domoh ; Ninigret, his cousin ; King Philip, the last of the Wampanoags ; Canonchet, and Anna- 
Wan. We shall meet them in future pages. 




22 THE ABORIGINALS. 

The Aboriginals who inhabited the country from Connecticut to the Saco 
River, were called the New England Indians. The principal tribes were the 
Narragansets in Rhode Island, and on the western shores of Narraganset Bay ; 
the Pokonokets and Wampanoags on the eastern shore of the same bay, and in 
a portion of Massachusetts ; the Nipmucs in the center of Massachusetts ; the 
Massachusetts in the vicinity of Boston and the shores southward; and the 
Pawtuckets in the north-eastern part of Massachusetts, embracing the Penna- 
cooks of New Hampshire. These were divided into smaller bands, having 
petty chiefs. The Pokonokets, for example, were divided into nine separate 
cantons or tribes, each having its military or civil ruler, but all holding alle- 
giance to one Grand Sachem. They were warlike, and were continually 
engaged in hostilities with the Five Nations, or with the Mohegans. The 
English and Dutch effected a general peace among them in 1673. Two years 
afterward [1675], Metacomet (King Philip) aroused most of the New England 
tribes against the English. A fierce war ensued, but ended in the subjugation 
of the Indians and the death of Philip, in 1676.' The power of the New 
England Indians was then completely broken. Some joined the more eastern 
tribes, and others took refuge in Canada, from whence they frequently came to 
the border settlements on errands of revenge.^ These incursions ceased when 
the French dominion in Canada ended in 1763.' When the Puritans came* 
[1620], the New England Indians numbered about ten thousand souls; now 
[1883] probably not three hundred representatives remain ; and the dialects 
of all, excepting that of the Narragansets, are forgotten. 

Eastward of the Saco River were the Abenakes. The chief tribes were the 
Penobscots, Norridgewocks, Androscoggins, and Passamaquoddies. These, 
with the more eastern tribes of the Micmacs and Etchemins, were made nom- 
inal Christians by the French Jesuits ;' and they were all firm allies of the 
French until the conquest of Canada by the English, in 1760.* Most of the 
Abenakes, except the Penobscots, withdrew to Canada in 1754. A few 
scattered families of the latter yet [1883] dwell upon the banks of the Penob- 
scot River, and wanderers are seen on the St. Lawrence. Like other New 
England tribes, they are rapidly fading, and will, doubtless, be extinct before 
the dawn of another century. 



CHAPTER III. 

^ THE HURON-IROQUOIS. 

We now come to consider the most interesting, in many respects, of all the 
aboriginal tribes of North America, called Iroquois by the French. The pre- 
fix "Huron" was given, because that people seemed, by their language, to form 

* Page 128. » Page 130. " Page 202. * Page 114. * Page 130. " Page 203. 



THE HURON-IROQUOIS. 23 

a part of the Iroquois nation, and like them, were isolated in the midst of the 
Algonquins, when discovered by the Europeans. The great body of the 
Iroquois occupied almost the whole territoiy in Canada, south-west of the 
•Ottowa River, between Lakes Ontario, Erie and Huron ; a greater portion of 
•the State of New York, and a part of Pennsylvania and Ohio along the south- 
'Crn shores of Lake Erie. They were completely surrounded by the Algon- 
quins, in whose southern border in portions of North Carolina and Virginia, 
were the Tuscaroras and a few smaller Iroquois tribes.' The Hurons occupied 
the Canadian portions of the territory, and the land on the southern shore of 
Lake Erie, and appeared to be a distinct nation ; but their language was found 
to be identical with that of the Iroquois. The Hurons consisted of four smaller 
tribes, namely, the Wyandots or Hurons proper, the Attiouandirons,' the 
Eries, and the Andastes. The two latter tribes were south of the lake, and 
claimed jurisdiction back to the domains of the Shawnoese.' 

Those "Romans of the Western World," the Five Nations, or Iroquois 
proper, formed a confederacy composed of the Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, 
Oneida, and Mohawk tribes, all occupying lands within the present State of New 
York. They fancifully called their confederacy the Long House. The eastern 
•door was kept by the Mohawks ; the western by the Senecas ; and the Great 
Council fire was with the Onondagas, at the metropolis, or chief village, near 
the present city of Syracuse. The French, as we have observed, gave them 
the name of Iroquois ; the Algonquins called them Mingoes." At what time 
the confederacy was formed, is not known. It was strong and powerful when 
the French discovered them, in 1609, and they were then engaged in bloody 
wars with their kinsmen, the Wyandots.^ 

1 The Southern Iroquois were the Tuscaroras, Chowans, Meherrins, and Nottoways. The thre.^ 
latter were upon the rivers in lower Virginia, called by their respective names, and were knowL 
under the general title of Tuscaroras. 

= Neutral Nation. When the Hurons and Five Nations were at war, the Attiouandirons fled 
to the Sandusky, and built a fort for each of the belligerents when in that region. But their neu- 
trality did not save them from internal feuds which finally dismembered the tribe. One party 
joined the Wyandots ; the other the Iroquois. 

3 Page 19. 

4 Mingoes, Minquas, and Maquas, were terms more particularly applied to the Mohawk tribe, 
who called themselves Kayingehaga, "possessors of the flint." The confederation assumed the 
title of Aquinuschioni, " united people ;" or as some say, Konoshioni, " cabin builders." 

5 The time of the formation of the confederation is supposed to have been at about the year 
1539. According to their own tradition, it was about two generations before the white people 
.came to trade with them. Clarke, in his history of Onondaga county, has given, from the lips of an 
old chief of the Onondaga tribe, that beautiful legend of the formation of the great confederacy, 
which forms tlie basis of Longfellow's Indian Edda, " Hi-a-wat-ha." Centuries ago, the story 
■runs, the deity who presides over fisheries find streams, came from his dwelhng-place in the clouds, 
,to visit the inhabitants of earth. He was delighted with the land where the tribes that afterward 
formed the confederacy, dwelt ; and having bestowed many blessings on that land, he laid aside his 
Divine character, and resolved to remain on earth. He selected a beautiful residence on the shore 
of Te-ungk-too (Cross lake), and all the people called him Hi-a-wat-ha, "the wise man." After a 
while, the people were alarmed by the approach of a ferocious band of warriors from the country 
•north of the great lakes. Destruction seemed inevitable. The inhabitants thronged around the 
lodge of Hi-a-wat-ha, from all quarters, craving his wise advice in this hour of great peril. After 
solemn meditaJion, he told them to call a grand council of all the tribes. The chiefs and warriors 
from far and l 3ar, assembled on the banks of Lake Oh-nen-ta-ha (Onondaga). The council-fire 
blazed three days before the venerable Hi-a-wat-ha arrived. He had been devoutly praying, in 
sOence, to the Great Spirit, for guidance. Then, with his darling daughter, a virgin of twelve 
_years, he entered his v.iiite canoe, and, to the great joy of the people, he appeared on the Oh-nen- 



24 THE ABORIGINALS. 

In the year 1649, the Five Nations resolved to strike a final and decisive 
blow against their western neighbors, and, gathering all their warriors, they 
made a successful invasion of the Wyandot, or Huron country. Great num- 
bers of the Wyandots were slain and made prisoners, and the whole tribe was 
dispersed. Some of the fugitives took refuge with the Chippewas ; other.s 
fled to Quebec, and a few were incorporated into the Iroquois confederacy. 
Yet the spirit of the Wyandots was not subdued, and they claimed and exer- 
cised sovereignty over almost the whole of the Ohio country. They had great 
influence among the Algonquin tribes,' and even as late as the treaty of 
Greenville, in 1795, the principal cession of lands in Ohio to the United 
States was made by the Wyandot chiefs in council." They, too, are reduced to 
a mere remnant of less than five hundred souls, and now [188.3] they occupy 
lands on the Neosho River, a chief tributary of the Arkansas. 

Being exceedingly warlike, the Five Nations made hostile expeditions 
against the New England Indians' in the East, the Eries, Andastes, and 

ta-ha. A great shout greeted him, and as he landed and walked up the bank, a sound like a 
rushing wind was heard ; a dark spot, every moment increasing in size, was descending from the 
clear sky. Fear seized the people ; but Hi-a-wat-ha stood unmoved. The approaching object was 
an immense bird. It came swiftly to earth, crushed the darling daughter of Hi-a-wat-ha — was itself 
destroyed, but the wise man was unharmed. Grief for his bereavement prostrated him in the dust 
for three days. The council anxiously awaited his presence. At length he came : the subject of 
the peril from invaders was discussed, and aft,er deliberating a day, the venerable Hi-a-wat-ha 
arose and said : 

"Friends and Brothers — You are members of many tribes and nations. You have come here, 
many of you, a great distance from your homes. "We have met for one common purpose — to pro- 
mote one common interest, and that is, to provide for our mutual safety, and how it shall best b& 
accomplished. To oppose these foes from the north by tribes, singly and alone, would prove our 
certain destruction. We can make no progress in that way. We must unite ourselves into one 
common band of brothers ; thus united, we may drive the invaders back ; this must be done, and 
we shall be safe. 

" You, the Mohawks, sitting under the shadow of the • Great Tree,' whose roots sink deep 
into the earth, and whose branches spread over a vast country, shall be the first nation, because 
you are warUke and mighty. 

"And you, Oneidas, a people who recline your bodies against the 'Everlasting Stone,' that 
can not be moved, shall be the second nation, because you give wise counsel. 

"And you, Oxondagas, who have your habitation at the 'Great Mountain,' and are over- 
shadowed by its crags, shall be the tliird nation, because you are greatly gifted in speech, and 
mighty in war. 

"And you, Catugas, a people whose habitation is the 'Dark Forest,' and whose home is every- 
where, shall be the fourth nation, because of your superior cunning in hunting. 

"And you. Senegas, a people who Uve in the 'Open Country,' and possess much wisdom,, 
shall be the fifth nation, because you understand better the art of raising corn and beans, and 
making cabins. 

" You, five great and powerful nations, must unite and have but one common interest, and no 
foe shall be able to disturb or subdue you. If we unite, the Great Spirit wiU smile upon 
us. Brothers, these are the words of Hi-a-wat-ha — let them sink deep into your hearts. I hava 
said it." 

They reflected for a day, and then the people of the "Great Tree," the "Everlasting Stone," 
the "Great Mountain," the "Dark Forest," and the " Open Country," formed a league like that of 
the Amphyctioni of Greece. The enemy was repulsed, and the Five Nations became the terror 
of the Continent. Then Hi-a-watha said, 

" The Great Master of Breath calls me to go. I have patiently waited his summons. I an;- 
ready — farewell !" 

Myriads of singing voices burst upon the ears of the multitude, and the whole air seemed filled 
with music. Hi-a-wat-ha, seated in his white canoe, rose majestically above the throng, and as all 
eyes gazed in rapture upon the ascending wise man, he disappeared forever in the blue vault of 
heaven. The music melted into low whispers, like the soft summer breeze; and there were, 
pleasant dreams in every cabin of the Five Nations on that blessed night. 

' Page 17. 2 Page 374. 3 Pagg 22^ 



THE HURON-IROQUOIS. 



25 



Miamies in the West,' and penetrated to the domains of the Catawbas^ and 
Cherokees' in the South. They subjugated the Eries in 1655, and after a con- 
test of twenty years, brought the Andastes into vassalage. They conquered 
the Miamies* and Ottawas* in 1657, and made incursions as far as the Roanoke 
and Cape Fear Rivers to the land of their kindred in language, the Tuscaroras, 
in 1701." Thirty years afterward, having been joined by the Tuscaroras, and 
the name of the confederacy changed to that of the Six Nations, they made 
war upon the Cherokees and Catawbas.^ They were led on by Hi-o-ka-too, a 
Seneca chief. The Catawbas were almost annihilated by them, after a battle 
of two days. So determined were the Five Nations to subdue the southern 
tribes, that when, in 1744, they ceded a part of their lands to Virginia, they 
reserved a perpetual privilege of a war-path through the territory. 

In the year 1712, the Tuscaroras having been signally defeated by the 
Carolinians,* came northward, and in 1714 joined the Five Nations. From 
that time the confederacy was known as the Six Nations. They were gen- 
erally the sure friends of the English and inveterate foes of the French.* 




c/(f(^^/^'^^^^^'^^ 



They were all friends of the British during the Revolution, except a part of 
the Oneidas, among whom the influence of the Rev. Samuel Kirkland'" was 



1 Page 17. « Page 26. 3 Page 27. « Page 17. s Page 17 

6 Page 168. ' Page 17. 8 Page 168. » Page 192. 

JO Samuel Kirkland was one of the most laborious and self-sacriflcing of the earlier missionaries, 
who labored among the tribes of the Six Nations. He was born at Norwich, Connecticut, in 
December, 1741. He was educated at Dr. Wlieelock's school, at Lebanon, where he prepared for 
that missionary work in which he labored forty years. His efforts were put forth chiefly among^ 



26 THE ABORIGINALS. 

very powerful, in favor of the Republicans. The Mohawks were the most 
active enemies of the Americans ; and thej were obliged to leave the State and 
take refuge in Canada at the close of the Revolution. The others were allowed 
to remain, and now [1883] mere fragments of that great confederation exist, 
and, in habits and character, they are radically changed. The confederacy 
was forever extinguished by the sale of the residue of the Seneca lands in 
1838. In 1715, the confederacy numbered more than forty thousand souls ; 
now [1883] they are probably less than four thousand, most of whom are 
upon lands beyond the Mississippi.' 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE CATAWBAS. 



In that beautiful, hilly region, between the Yadkin and Catawba Rivers, on 
each side of the boundary line between North and South Carolina, dwelt thb 
Catawba nation. They were south-westward of the Tuscaroras, and were 
generally on good terms with them. They were brave, but not warlike, and 
their conflicts were usually in defense of their own territory. They expelled 
the fugitive Shawnoese in 1672,* but were overmatched and desolated by the 
warriors of the Five Nations' in 1701. They assisted the white people of 
South Carolina against the Tuscaroras and their confederates in 1712 ;* but 
when, three years afterward, the southern tribes, from the Neuse region to that 
of the St. Mary's, in Florida, and westward to the Alabama, seven thousand 



the Oneidas; and, during the Revolution, he was active in restraining them from an alhance with 
the rest of tlie confederacy against the Patriots. He was exceedingly useful in treaty-malcing; for 
he had the entire confidence of the Indians. He died at Paris, in Oneida county, in February, 
1808, in the 67th year of his age. See Lossing's '"Eminent Americans" for a more elaborate sl^etcla. 
' The ciiief men of the Five Nations, Ivnown to the white people, are Garangula, who was 
distinguislied toward the close of the seveuteentli century for liis wisdom and sagacity in council, 
and was of the Onondaga tribe. Logan, whose celebrated reply to a white messenger has been 
preserved by Mr. Jefferson, was of the Cayuga tribe. To the messenger he said: ''I appeal to any 
white man to say if he ever entered Logan's cabin hungry, and he gave liim no meat ; if ever he 
came cold and naked and he clothed him not." Then speaking of the craelty of the white people, 
who, in cold blood had murdered his family, he said : "They have murdered aU the relations of 
Logan — not even sparing my women and children. This called on me for revenge ; I have sought 
it. I have killed many. I have tiiUy glutted my vengeance. For my country, I rejoice at the 
beams of peace. But do not harbor ihe thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt 
fe«r. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan ? No i 
one 1" Joseph Brant (Tliayendanega), was the most celebrated of the Mohawk tribe ; and Red 
Jacket (Sagoyewatha), was a very renowned Seneca, greatly distinguished for his eloquence. 
Complanter, who Uved till past a century in age, was also a distinguished Seneca chief Red Jacket 
was very intemperate toward the latter part of his life. On one occasion a lady inquired after his 
cliildren. He had lost fourteen by consumption. Bowing his head, he said: "Red Jacket was 
once a great man, and in favor with the Great Spirit. He was a lofty pine among the smaller trees 
of the forest. But after years of glory, he degraded himself by drinking the lire-water of the white 
man. The Great Spirit has looked upon him in anger, and His Ughtning has stripped the pine of 
its branches!" 2 Page 19, 3 Page 23, *- Page 168. 



THE CHEROKEES. 27 

Strong, confederated in an attempt to exterminate the Carolinians,' the Cataw- 
bas were among them. 

They were again the active allies of the Carolinians in 1760, when the 
Cherokees made war upon them,' and they remained true friends of the white 
people afterward. They joined the Americans during the Revolution, and 
have ever since experienced the fostering care of the State, in some degree.^ 
Their chief village was upon the Catawba River, near the mouth of the Fishing 
Creek, in Yorkville district, South Carolina; and there the remnant of the 
nation, numbering less than a hundred souls, were living upon a reservation, a 
few miles square, when the late Civil War began. 



CHAPTER V, 

THE CHEROKEES. 

Of all the Indian tribes, the Cherokees, who dwelt westward and adjoining 
the Tuscaroras^ and Catawbas,^ among the high hills and fertile valleys, have 
ever been the most susceptible to the influences of civilization. They have been 
properly called the mountaineers of the South. Their beautiful land extended 
from the Carolina Broad River on the east, to the Alabama on the Avest, includ- 
ing the whole of the upper portion of Georgia from the head waters of the Ala- 
tamaha, to those of the Tennessee. It is one of the most delightful regions of 
the United States. 

These mountaineers were the determined foes of the Shawnoese,^ and after 
many conflicts, they finally drove them from the country south of the Ohio 
River. They joined with the Catawbas and the white people against the Tus- 
€aroras in 1712,' but were members of the great confederation against the 
Carolinians in 1715,^ which we shall consider hereafter. 

The Five Nations and the Cherokees had bloody contests for a long time. 
A reconciliation was finally effected by the English about the year 1750, and 
the Cherokees became the allies of the peace-makers, against the French. 
They assisted in the capture of Fort Du Quesne in 1758,^ but their irregular- 
ities, on their return along the border 'settlements of Virginia, gave the white 
people an apparent excuse for killing two or three warriors. Hatred v.as en- 
gendered, and the Cherokees soon afterward retaliated by spreading destruction 

• Page 170. 2 Page 204, 

' In 1822, a Catawba warrior made an eloquent appeal to the legislature of South Carolina for 
aid. "I pursued the deer for subsistence," he said, "but the deer are disappenring, and I must 
starve. God ordained me for the forests, and my ambition is the shade. But the strength of my 
arm decays, and my feet fail me in the chase. The hand that fought for your hberties is now open 
to you for relief" A pension was granted. 

4 Page 25. s Pao-e 204. 6 Pao-e 19. 

7 Page 168. s Page 170. 9 Page 18G. 



28 THE ABORIGINALS. 

along the frontiers.' Hostilities continued a greater portion of three years,, 
when peace was established in 1761, and no more trouble ensued. 

Durino- the Revolution the Cherokees adhered to the British ; and for eight 
years afterward they continued to annoy the people of the upper country of the 
Carolinas. They were reconciled by treaty in 1791. They were friends of the 
United States in 1812, and assisted in the subjugation of the Creeks.^ Civili- 
zation Avas rapidly elevating them from the condition of roving savages, to agri- 
culturists and artisans, when their removal west of the Mississippi was required. 
They had established schools, a printing press, and other means for improve- 
ment and culture, when they were compelled to leave their farms for a new" 
home in the wilderness.^ They are in a fertile country, watered by the 
Arkansas and its tributaries, and now [1883] number about fourteen thousand 
souls. They w^ere in a prosperous condition when the late Civil War began.* 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE UCHEES. 



In the pleasant country extending from the Savannah River, at Augusta, 
westward to Milledgeville, and along the banks of the Oconee and the head 
waters of the Ogeechee and Chattahooche, the Europeans found a remnant of 
the once powerful nation of the Uchees. Their language was exceedingly 
harsK, and totally unlike that of any other people on the continent. They 
claimed to be descendants of the most ancient inhabitants of the country, and 
took great pride in the fact ; and they had no tradition of their ever occupy- 
ing any other territory than the domain on which they were found. They, 
too, have been driven beyond the Mississippi by the pressure of civilization,, 
and have become partially absorbed by the Creeks, with whom less than 
800 souls yet [18S3] remain. They are, in fact, an extinct nation, and 
their languajje is almost forccotten. 



' Pa^e 204. ^ Page 428. 

3 A native Cherokee, named by the white people, George Guess (Sequoyah), who was ignorant 
of every language but his own, seeing books in the missionary schools, and being told that the 
characters represented the words of the spoken English language, conceived the idea of forming a 
written language for his people. He first made a separate character for each word, but this made 
the whole matter too voluminous, and he formed a syllabic alphabet of eighty-five characters. It 
was soon ascertained that this was sufficient, even for the copious language of the Cherokees, and 
this syllabic alphabet was soon adopted, in the preparation of books for the. missionary schools. In 
1826, a newspaper, called the Cherokee Phcenix, printed m the new characters, was established. 
Many of the native Cherokees are now well educated, but the great body of the natives are in ig- 
norance. 

* Note 4. page 32. 



THE MOBILIAN TRIBES. 29 

CHAPTER YII. 

THE NATCHEZ. 

Of this once considerable nation, who inhabited the borders of the Missis- 
sippi, where a modern city now perpetuates their name, very little is known. 
When first discovered by the French, they occupied a territory about as large 
as that inhabited by the lichees. It extended north-easterly from the Missis- 
sippi along the valley of the Pearl River, to the upper waters of the Chickasa- 
haw. For a long time they were supposed to belong to the nation of Mobilian 
tribes, by whom they were surrounded, but their language proved them to be a 
distinct people. They were sun-worshippers ; and from this circumstance, 
some had supposed that they had once been in intimate communication with 
the adorers of the great luminary in Central and South America. In many 
things they were much superior to their neighbors, and displayed signs of the 
refinement of a former more civihzed condition. They became jealous of the 
French on their first appearance upon the Mississippi, and finally they con- 
spired, with others, to drive the intruders from the country. The French fell 
upon, and almost annihilated the nation, in 1730. They never recovered from 
the shock, and after maintaining a feeble nationality for almost a century, they 
have become merged into the Creek confederacy. They now [1S83] number 
less than three hundred souls, and their language, in its purity, is unknown. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE MOBILIAN TRIBES. 

Like the Algonquins and Iroquois nations, the Mobilian was composed of 
a great number of tribes, speaking different dialects of the same lano-uao-e. 
Their territory was next in extent to that of the Algonquins.' It stretched 
along the Gulf of Mexico, from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, more than six 
hundred miles ; up the Mississippi as far as the mouth of the Ohio ; and along 
the Atlantic to Cape Fear. It comprised a greater portion of the present State 
of Georgia, the whole of Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi, and parts of South 
Carolina, Tennessee, and Kentucky. The nation was divided into three grand 
confederacies of tribes, namely, Muscogees or Creeks Choctaws, and Chick- 



Page 17. 



30 



THE ABORIGINALS. 




SOUTHERN INDIANS. 



The Creek Confederacy extended from the 
Atlantic westward to the high lands which sep- 
arate the waters of the Alabama and Tombigbee 
Rivers, including a great portion of the States of 
Alabama and Georgia, and the whole of Florida. 
Oglethorpe's first inter vie v/s' with the natives at 
Savannah, were with people of this confederacy. 
The Yamassees, or Savannahs of Georgia and 
South Carolina, and the Seminoles of Florida, were of the Creek confederacy. 
The latter were strong and warlike. They Avere at the head of the Indian 
confederacy, to destroy the white people, in 1715.^ When the general dis- 
persion followed that abortive attempt, the Yamassees took refuge with the 
Spaniards of Florida. Small bands often annoyed the white frontier settle- 
ments of Georgia, but they were not engaged in general hostilities until the 
Revolution, when the whole Creek confederacy^ took part with the British. 

The most inveterate and treacherous enemy of the white people, have ever 
been the Seminoles. Bands of them often went out upon the war-path, with 
the Yamassees, to slay the pale-faces. They joined the British in 1812-14; 
and in 1817 they renewed hostilities.* They were subdued by General Jack- 
son, and afterward remained comparatively quiet until 1835, when they agam 
attacked the white settlements.^ They were subjugated in 1842, after many 
lives and much treasure had been sacrificed." A few of them yet [1883] 
remain in the everglades of Florida, but a greater jiortion of the tribe have 
gone west of the Mississippi, witli the other members of the Creek confederacy. 
The Creeks proper now [1883] number about fifteen thousand souls. The 
number of the whole confederacy is about twenty-four thousand. They 
occupy lands upon the Arkansas and its tributaries, and are among the most 
peaceable and order-loving of the banished tribes. 

In the beautiful country bordering upon the Gulf of Mexico, and extending 
west of the Creeks to the Mississippi, lived the Choctaws. They were an agri- 
cultural people when the Europeans discovered them ; and, attached to home 
and quiet pursuits, they have ever been a peaceful people. Their wai-s have 
always been on the defensive, and they never had public feuds with either their 
Spanish, French, or English neighbors. They, too, have been compelled tr 
abandon their native country for the uncultivated wilderness west of Arkansas, 
between the Arkansas and Red Rivers. They now [1883] number about thirteen 
thousand souls. They retnin their peaceable character in their new homes. 

The Chickasaw tribe inhabited the country along the Mississippi, from the 
borders of the Choctaw domain to the Ohio River, and eastward beyond the Ten- 
nessee to the lands of the Cherokees^ and Shawnees.^ This warlike people were 
the early friends of the English, and the most inveterate foes of the French, 



'Page 102. 2 Page no. 

' This confederacy now [1883] consists of the Creeks proper, Seminoles, Natchez, Hichittiea, 
and Alabamas. The Creeks, like many other tribes, claim to be the Original People. 

* Page 448. ' Page 466. « Page 468. ^ Page 27. ^ Page 19. 



THE DAHCOTAH OR SIOUX TRIBES, 31 

-who had twice [1736-1740] invaded their country. They adhered to the 
British during the Revolution, but since that time they have held friendly rela- 
tions with the Government of the United States. The remnant, about four 
thousand in number, are upon lands almost a hundred leagues westward of the 
Mississippi. 

Thus, with almost chronological brevity, we have given an outline sketch 
of the history of the Aboriginal nations with whom the first European settlers 
in the United States became acquainted. They have now no legal habitation 
eastward of the Mississippi ; and the fragments of those powerful tribes who 
once claimed sovereignty over twenty-four degrees of longitude and twenty 
degrees of latitude, are now [1883] compressed within a quadrangle of about 
nine degrees, between the Red and Missouri Rivers.^ Wliether the grave of 
the last of those great tribes shall be within their present domain, or in some 
valley among the crags of the Rocky Mountains, expediency will hereafter 
determine. 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE DAHCOTAH OR SIOUX TRIBES. 

The French were the earliest explorers of the regions of the Middle and 
Upper Mississippi, and they found a great number of tribes west of that river 
who spoke dialects of the same language. They occupied the vast domain from 
the Arkansas on the south, to the western tributary of Lake Winnipeg on the 
north, and westward to the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains. These 
have been classed into four grand divisions, namely, the Winnebagoes, who 
inhabited the country between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi, among the 
Algonquins f the Assinniboins and Sioux proper, the most northerly nation ; 
the MiNETAREE Group in the Minnesota Territory, and 'the Southern Sioux, 
who dwelt in the country between the Arkansas and Platte Rivers, and whose 
hunting-ground extended to the Rocky Mountains. 

The most uneasy of these tribes were the Winnebagoes, who often attacked 
the Sioux west of the Mississippi. They generally lived on friendly terms 
with the Algonquins, after their martial spirit was somewhat subdued by the 
Illinois, who, in 1640, almost exterminated them. They were enemies to the 

' Mr. Bancroft [II., 253] after consulting the most reliable authorities on the subject, makes the 
following estimate of the entire Aboriginal population in 1650- Algonquins, 90,000; Eastern 
Sioux, less than 3,000; Iroquois, including then- southern kindred, about 17,000; Catawbas, 3,000, 
Cherokees (now more numerous than ever), 12,000; Mobihan tribes, 50,000; Uchees, 1,000; 
Natchez, 4,000 — in all, 180,000. These were the only nations and tribes then known. With the 
expansion of our territory westward and southward, we have embraced numerous Indian nations, 
some of them quite populous, until the number of the estimate above givea has been almost 
doubled, according to the late census. 

* Page 1^ 



32 THEABORIGINALS 

United States during the second war with Great Britain/ and they confeder- 
ated with the Sacs and Foxes in hostilities against the white people, under 
Black Hawk, in 1832.- The tribe, now [1881] less than four thousand strong, 
are seated upon the Mississippi, about eighty miles above St. Paul, the capital 
of Minnesota. Fear of the white' people keeps them quiet. 

In the cold, wet country of the North, the Assiniboins yet inhabit their na- 
tive land. Having separated from the nation, they are called " rebels." Their 
neighbors, the Sioux proper, were first visited by the French in 1660, and 
have ever been regarded as the most fierce and warlike people on the continent. 
They also occupy their ancient domain, and are now [1883] about fifteen 
thousand strong. 

Further westward are the Minetarees, ]\Iandans, and Crows, who form the 
MiNETAREE Group. They are classed with the Dahcotahs or Sioux, although 
the languages have only a slight afiinity. The Minetarees and Mandans num- 
ber about three thousand souls each. They cultivate the soil, and live in vil- 
lages. The Crows number about fifteen hundred, and are wanderers and 
hunters. The Mandans are very light-colored. Some suppose them to be 
descendants of a colony from Wales, who, it is believed, came to America 
under Madoc, the son of a Welsh prince, in the twelfth century.^ 

There are eight in number of the Southern Sioux tribes, namely, the 
Arkansas, Osages, Kansas, lowas, Missouries, Otoes, Omahas, and Puncahs. 
They are cultivators and hunters. They live in villages a part of the year, 
and are abroad upon their hunting-grounds during the remainder. Of these 
tribes, the Osages are the most warlike and powerful. All of the Southern 
Sioux tribes are upon lands watered by the Missouri and the Platte, and their 
tributaries. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE EXTREME WESTERN TRIBES. 

Within a few years, our domain has been widely expanded, and in our 
newly-acquired possessions on the borders of Mexico and the Pacific coast, and 
the recently organized Territories in the interior of the continent, are numer- 
ous powerful and warlike tribes,^ of whom little is known, and whose history 

' Page 260. 2 Page 287. 

' It is said that Madoc, son of Prince Owen Gwignedd, sailed from Wales, with ten ships and 
three hundred men, at about the year 1170, on an exploring voyage, and never returned. Many 
learned conjectures have been expressed, and among them the belief that the expedition reached 
the American continent, and became the progenitors of the Mandans, or White Indians, of our 
western plains. 

* The whole number of Indians within the present limits of the United States, in 1881, accord- 
ing to ofBcial estimates, was a little less than 300,000. There are about 15,000 in the States east- 
ward of the Mississippi, principally in New York, Michigan, and Wisconsin ; the remainder, consist- 
ing of Cherokees, Choctaws, and Seminoles, being in North Carolina.. Mississippi, and florida. The 



THE EXTREME "WESTERN TRIBES. 33 

has no connection with that of the people of the United States, except the fact 
that thej were original occupants of the soil, and that some of them, especially 
the California and Oregon Indians, yet [1881] dispute our right to sovereignty. 
Of these, the Comanches and Apaches of California are the most warhke. The 
Pawnees upon the Great Plains toward the Rocky Mountains are very numer- 
ous, but not so warlike ; and the Utahs, among the Wasatch and neighboring 
ranges, are strong in numbers. Further northward and westward are the 
Blackfeet, Crow, Snake, Nezperces, and Flathead Indians, and smaller clans, 
with petty chiefs, whose domains stretch away toward the Knisteneaux and 
Esquimaux on the extreme north. 

These tribes are rapidly 'fading in the light of modern civilization, and are 
destined to total annihilation. The scythe of human progress is steadily cut- 
ting its swathes over all their lands ; and the time is not far distant when the 
foot-prints of the Indians will be no more known within the domain of our Re- 
public. In future years, the dusky son of an exile, coming from the fir-oflf 
borders of the Slave Lake, will be gazed at in the streets of a city at the mouth 
of the Yellow Stone, with as much wonder as the Oneida woman, with her blue 
cloth blanket and bead- work merchandize is now [1881] in the city of New 
York. So the Aboriginals of our land are passing away, and even now they 
may chant in sorrow : 

" We, the riglitful lords of yore, 
Are the rightful lords no more ; 
Like the silver mist, we fail, 
Like the red leaves on the gale — 
Fsbd, like shadows, when the dawning 
"Waves the bright flag of the morning." 

J. McLellan, Jr. 

" I vriW weep for a season, in bitterness fed, 
For my kindred are gone to the hills of the dead; 
But they died not of hunger, or lingering decay — 
The hand of the white man hath swept them away." 

Henry Rowb Schoolcraft. 



number in Minnesota and along the frontiers of the "Western States and Texas (most of them emi- 
grants from the country eastward of the Mississippi), is estimated at 80,000. Those on the Plains 
and among the Rocky Mountains, not within any organized Territory, at 50,000; in Texas, at 
25,000; in New Mexico, at 30,000; in California, at 18,000; in Utah, at 10,000; in Oregon and 
"Washington Territories, at 20,000 ;— total, 308,000. For more minute accounts of the Indians, 
see Heckewelder's "History of the Indian Nations;" Schoolcraft's "Algic Researches;" 
M'Kinney's "History of the Indian Tribes;" Drake's "Book of the Indians;" Catlin's "Letters 
and Notes;" Schoolcraft's "Notes on the Iroquois." 

To the Department of the Interior of the National Government is intrusted the administration 
of Indian affairs. At this time [1881] the stocks and bonds held by the Department in trust tor 

^the Indians, from the income of which annuities are paid to them, amount to more than three 

.millions of doUara. „ 








^'•^^ I LOLLJBLS EEFUHE THK COUNCIL OP SALAMANCA. 



SECOND PERIOD. 
DISCOVERIES 



CHAPTER I. 



SCANDINAVIAN VOYAGES AND DISCOVERIES. 



AMERIGO VESPUCCI. 



One of the most interesting of the un- 
solved problems of history, is that which re- 
lates to the alleged discovery of America by mariners of north- 
ern Europe, almost five hundred years before Columbus left 
Palos, in Spain, to accomplish that great event. The tales and 
poetry of Iceland abound with intimations of such discoveries ; 
and records of early voyages from Iceland to a continent south- 
westward of Greenland, have been found. These, and the re- 
sults of recent investigations, appear to prove, by the strongest 
circumstantial evidence, that the New England' coast was vis- 
ited, and that settlements thereon were attempted by Scandi- 
navian navigators, 2 almost five centuries before the great Genoese 
undertook his first voyage in quest of a western passage to 
India. 

' The States of our Union eastward of New York are collectively called New England. P. 74. 
2 The ancients called the territory which contains modern Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Lapland, 
Jceland, Fmland, etc., by the general name of Scandinavia. 




SCANDINAVIAN VOYAGES AND DISCOVERIES. 



35 




The navigators of northern Europe were remarkable for their boldness and 
perseverance. They discovered Iceland in the year 860, and colonized it. 
In 890 they colonized Greenland, and planted colonies there also. There was 
traflfic, friendly and lucrative, between the colonists of Iceland and Greenland, 
and the parent Norwegians and Danes, as early as the year 950, and no mar- 
iners Avere so adventurous as these Northmen. In 
the year 1002, according to an Icelandic chronicle, a 
Norwegian vessel, commanded by Captain Lief, sailed 
from Iceland for Greenland. A gale drove the voy- 
agers to the coast of Labrador. They explored the 
shores southward to the region of a genial climate, 
"where they found noble forests and abundance of 
grapes. This, it is supposed, was the vicinity of norman ship. 

Boston. Other voyages to the new-found land were 

afterward made by the adventurous Scandinavians, and they appear to have 
extended their explorations as far as Rhode Island — perhaps as far south as 
Cape May. 

It is further asserted that settlements in that pleas- 
ant climate were attempted, and that the child of a Scan- ^t I 
dinavian mother was born upon the shore of Mount Hope W -^ 
Bay, in Rhode Island.* In the absence of actual charts W % 
and maps, to fix these localities of latitude and longitude, " • 
of course they must be subjects of conjecture only, for ^^ \^ 
these explorers left no traces of their presence here, un- 
less it shall be conceded that the round tower at New- 
port,^ about the origin of which history and tradition are 
silent, was built by the Northmen. 

The period of this alleged discovery was that of the dark ages, when ig- 
norance brooded over Europe, like thick night. Information of these voyages 
seems not to have spread, and no records of intercourse Avith a western conti- 
nent later than 1120, have been found. The great discovery, if made, was for- 
gotten, or remembered only in dim traditionary tales of the exploits of the old 
" Sea-Kings"^ of the North. Eor centuries afterward, America was an un- 



TOWER AT NEWPORT. 



1 Tlie old chronicle referred to says that Gudrida, wife of a Scandinavian navigator, gave birth 
to a child in America, to whom she gave the name of Snorre ; and it is further asserted tliat Ber- 
tel Thorwalsden, the great Danish sculptor, was a descendant of this early white American. Tlie 
records of these voyages were compiled by Bishop Thorlack, of Iceland, who was also a descendant 
of Snorre. 

2 This structure is of unhewn stone, laid in mortar made of the gravel of the soil around, and 
oyster-shell Hme. It is a cylinder resting upon eight round columns, twenty-three feet in diameter, 
and twenty-four feet in height It was originally covered with stucco. It seems to have stood 
there when the white people first visited Rhode Island, and the Narraganset Indians, it is as- 
serted, had no tradition of its origin. There can be httle doubt, all things considered, of its having 
been constructed by those northern navigators, who made attempts at settlement in that viciivity. 

3 This name was given to bold adventurers of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, who rebelled 
against Gorm the Old of Norway, and Harold Fairhair of Denmark, their conquerors, forsook their 
country, settled upon the islands of the North Sea, and Greenland, and from tiience went forth 
upon piratical expeditions, even as far south as the pleasant coasts of France. The_y trafficked, as 
well as plundered ; and finally sweepmg over Denmark and Germany, obtained possession of some 



36 DISCOVERIES. [1492. 

known region. It had no place upon maps, unless as an imaginary island 
■without a name, nor in the most acute geographical theories of the learned. 
When Columbus conceived the grand idea of reaching Asia by sailing westward, 
no whisper of those Scandinavian voyages was heard in Europe. 



CHAPTER II. 

SPANISH VOYAGES AND DISCOVERIES. 

The first half of the fifteenth century was distinguished for great commer- 
cial activity. Sluggish Europe was just awaking from its slumber of ceiituries, 
and maritime discoveries were prosecuted with untiring zeal by the people 
inhabiting the great south-western peninsula covered by Spain, Portugal, and 
France. The incentives to make these discoveries grew out of the political 
condition of Europe, and the promises of great commercial advantages. The 
rich commerce of the East centered in Rome, when that empire overshad- 
owed the known world. When it fell into fragments, the Italian cities con- 
tinued their monopoly of the rich trade of the Indies. Provinces which had 
arisen into independent kingdoms, became jealous of these cities, so rapidly 
outstripping them in power and opulence ; and Castile and Portugal, in par- 
ticular, engaged in efforts to open a direct trade with the East. The ocean was 
the only highway for such commerce, toward which the rivals could look with 
a hope of success. The errors of geographical science interposed great obsta- 
cles. Popular belief pictured an impassable region of fire beyond Cape Baja- 
dor, on the coast of Africa ; but bold navigators, under the auspices of Prince 
Henry of Portugal, soon penetrated that dreaded latitude, crossed the torrid 
zone, and, going around the southern extremity of Africa, opened a pathway 
to the East, through the Indian Ocean. 

The Portuguese court at Lisbon soon became a 
point of great attraction to the learned and adven- 
turous. Among others came Christopher Columbus, 
the son of a wool-carder of Genoa, a mariner of 
great experience and considerable repute, and then 
in the prime of life. In person he was tall and 
commanding, and, in manners, exceedingly winning 
and graceful, for one unaccustomed to the polish of 
courts, or the higher orders in society. The rudi- 
ments of geometry, which he had learned in the 




of the best portions of Gaul. They finally invaded the British Islands, and placed Canute upon 
the throne of Alfred. It was among these people that chivalry, as an institution, originated ; and 
back to tliose " Sea- Kings" we may look for the hardiest elements of progress among the people 
of the United States. 



1609.] SPANISH VOYAGES AND DISCOVERIES. 37 

university of Pavia, had been for years working out a magnificent theory in 
his mind, and he came to Lisbon to seek an opportunity to test its truth. 

Fortune appeared to smile beneficently upon Columbus, during his early 
residence in Lisbon. He soon loved and married the daughter of Palestrello, 
a deceased navigator of eminence, and he became possessed of nautical papers 
of great value. They poured new light upon his mind. His convictions 
respecting the rotundity of the earth, and the necessity of a continent in the 
Atlantic Ocean, to balance the land in the eastern hemisphere ; or at least a 
nearer approach of eastern Asia to the shores of western Europe, than geo- 
graphical science had yet revealed, assumed the character of demonstrated 
realities. He was disposed to credit the narratives of Plato and other ancient 
writers, respecting the existence of a continent beyond the glorious, but long- 
lost, island of Atlantis, in the waste of waters westward of Europe. He was 
convmced that Asia could be reached much sooner by sailing westward, than 
by going around the Cape of Good Hope.' He based his whole theory upon 
the fundamental belief that the earth was a terraqueous globe, which might be 
traveled round from east to west, and that men stood foot to foot at opposite 
points. This, it should be remembered, was seventy years before Copernicus 
announced his theory of the form and motion of the planets [1543], and one 
hundred and sixty years [1633] before Galileo was compelled, before the 
court of the Inquisition at Rome, to renounce his belief in the diurnal revolu- 
tion of the earth. 

A deep religious sentiment imbued the whole being of Columbus, and he 
became strongly impressed with the idea that there were people "beyond the 
waste of waters westward, unto whom he was commissioned by heaven to 
carry the Gospel." With the lofty aspirations which his theory and his faith 
gave him, he prosecuted his plans with great ardor. He made a voyage -co 
Iceland, and sailed a hundred leagues beyond, to the ice-fields of the polar cir- 
cle. He probably heard, there, vague traditions of early voyages to a western 
continent,' which gave strength to his own convictions ; and on his return, he 
laid his plans first before his countrymen, the Genoese (who rejected them), 
and then before the monarchs of England* and Portugal. 

The Portuguese monarch appeared to comprehend the grand idea of Colum- 
bus, but it was too lofty for the conceptions of his council and the pedantic 
wise men of Lisbon. For a long time Columbus was annoyed by delays on the 
part of those to whose judgment the king deferred; and attempts were meanly 
and clandestinely made to get from Columbus the information which he pos- 
sessed. While awaiting a decision, liis wife died. The last link that bound 
him to Portugal was broken, and, taking his little son Diego by the hand, he 

' This point was first discovered by Diaz, a Portuguese navigator, who named it Stormy Cape, 
But King John, believing it to be that remote extremity of Africa so long sought, named it Gaps 
of Good Hope. Vasco de Gama passed it in 1497, and made his way to the East Indies beyond. 

2 His name was suggestive of a mission. Christo or Christ, and Colombo, a pigeon — carrier- 
pigeon. By this combination of significant words in his name, he believed himself to be a Christ, 
or Gospel-bearer, to the heathen, and he often signed his name Clnisto-ferens, or Christ-bearer. 

3 Page 34 * Page 46. 



38 DISCOVERIES. [1492. 

departed on foot to lay his proposition before Ferdinand and Isabella,' the 
monarchs of Spain — occupants of the united thrones of Arragon and Castile. 

Very poor, and greatly dispirited, Columbus arrived at the gate of the 
monastery of Rabida, near the little port from whence he afterward sailed, and 
begged food and shelter for himself and child. The good Father Marchena 
received him kindly, entered warmly into his plans, and was of essential service 
to him afterward. Through him Columbus obtained access to the court ; but 
the war with the Moors, then raging, delayed an opportunity for an audience 
with the monarchs for a long time. Yet he was not idle. He employed him- 
self in the alternate pursuits of science, and engagements in some of the military 
campaigns. He was continually treated with great deference by the court and 
nobility, and at length his importunities were heeded. A council of the learned 
men of the nation was convened at Salamanca, to consider his plans and propo- 
sitions.'' The majority pronounced his scheme vain and impracticable, and 
unworthy of the support of the government. But a minority of the council, 
wiser than the rest, did not acquiesce in this decision, and, with Cardinal Men-, 
doza and other officers of government, they encouraged the navigator by prom- 
ises of their continual support. But he became disgusted by procrastination, 
and abandoning the hope of royal aid, he applied to two wealthy dukes for 
assistance. They refused, and he left with a determination to lay his plans before 
the King of France. 

Columbus had been encouraged by Father Mar- 
chena (who had been Isabella's confessor),^ and through 
his intercession, the navigator was recalled before he 
had entered France. He sought and obtained a per- 
sonal interview with the queen. To her he revealed 
all his plans ; told her of the immense treasures that 
lay hidden in that far distant India* which might be 
easily reached by a shorter way, and pleaded eloquently 
for aid in his pious design of carrying the Gospel to the 
heathen of unknown lands. The last appeal aroused 
ISABELLA. the religious zeal of Isabella, and with the spirit of the 

Crusaders,* she dismissed Columbus with the assurance 

1 Isabella was a sister of the profligate Henry the Fourth of Castile and Leon. She was a pious, 
virtuous, and high-minded woman, tlien almost a phenomenon in courts. She was of middle size, 
and well formed, with a fair complexion, auburn hair, and clear, blue eyes. 

2 See the picture at the head of this chapter. The Council was composed of the professors of 
the university, various dignitaries of the Church, and learned friars. They were nearly all preju- 
diced against the poor navigator, and he soon discovered that ignorance and bigotry would defeat 
his purposes. 

3 All Roman Catholics are obliged to confess their sins to a priest. Rich and titled persons 
often had a priest confessor for themselves and their families exclusively. 

4 Marco Polo and other travelers had related wonderful stories of the beauty and wealth 
of a country beyond the limits of geographical knowledge, and had thus inflamed the avarice and 
ambition of tlie rich and powerful. The country was called Zipangi, and also Cathay. It included 
China and adiacent islands. 

5 About TOO years ago, the Christian powers of Europe fitted out expeditions to conquer 
Palestine, with the avowed object of rescuing the sepulcher of Jesus, at Jerusalem, from the hands 
of the Turks. These were called crusades — holy wars. The lives of two millions of people were 
lost in them. 




2609.] SPANISH VOYAGES AND DISCOVERIES. 39 

that he should have her aid in fitting out an exploring expedition, even if it should 
require the pawning of her crown jewels to obtain the money. And Isabella was 
faithful to her promise. She fitted out two caravels (light coasting ships), and 
Columbus, by the aid of friends, equipped a third and larger one. With this little 
fleet, bearing one hundred and twenty persons, he left Palos, on the Tinto River, 
in AntVilusia, on Friday, the 3d of August, 1492, to explore the stormy Atlantic' 

Columbus started on that perilous voyage without a reliable chart for his 
guidance, and no director in his course but the sun and stars, and the imperfect 
mariner's compass, then used only by a few in navigating the pleasant seas of 
the Old World. After various delays at the Canary Islands, they left them in 
the dim distance behind, on Sunday, the 9th of September. The broad At- 
lantic, mysterious and unknown, was before them. A voyage of great trial for 
the navigator was now fairly entered upon. His theory taught him to believe 
that he would reach Asia in the course of a few days. But weeks wore away • 
the needle^ became unfaithful; alarm and discontent prevailed, and several 
times his followers were on the point of compelling him to turn back. 

One pleasant evening (the 11th of October), the perfumes of flowers came 
upon the night breeze, as tokens of approach to land. The vesper hymn to the 
Virgin was sung, and Columbus, after recounting the blessings of God thus far 
manifested in the voyage, assured the crews that he confidently expected to see 
land in the morning. Yet they hesitated to believe, for twice before they had 
been mocked by other indications of land 
being near.^ On the high poop of his 
vessel the great navigator sat watching 
until midnight, when he saw the glim- 
mer of moving lights upon the verge of ■>, m j,. k ,,; \ ;,. \ r 
the horizon. He called others to con- '■ * ' ' , 

firm his vision, for he was fearful of 
mistake. They, too, perceived blazing . 
torches, and at dawn the next morning , _ 
their delighted eyes saw green forests ^„^ ^^ ~ ~ ^„ „ 

t=> J O THE FLEET OF C0LUJn3US. 

Stretching along the horizon; and as 

they approached, they were greeted by the songs of birds and the murmur of 

human voices. 

1 Columbus was appointed high-admiral of all seas which he might discover, with the attendant 
honors. Also viceroy of all lands discovered. He was to have one"-tenth of all profits of the first 
voyage, and by contributing an eighth of the expense of future voyages, was to have an eighth of 
all the profits. Although Isabella paid the whole expense, the contract was signed, also, by her 
husband. 

2 Needle, or pointer, of the mariner's compass. This instrument was first known in Europe, at 
Amalfi, about 1302. The Chinese claim to have possessed a knowledge of it more than 1 100 years 
before tlie birth of Christ. The needle was supposed to point toward tlie north star at all times. 
There is a continual variation from this line, now easily calculated, but unknown until discovered 
by Columbus. It perplexed, but did not dismay him. 

3 They had seen birds, but they proved to be the petrel, an ocean fowl. Bits of wood and sea- 
weeds had also been seen. These had undoubtedly been seen on the outer verge of the Gulf 
Stream, north-east of the Bahamas, where, according to Lieutenant Maury [Physical Geography of 
the Sea], there may always be found a drift of sea-weed, and sometimes objects that have floated 
from the land. 




40 



DISCOVERIES. 



[1492. 




BANNEK OF THE 
EXPEDITION. 



Arrayed in scarlet, and bearing his sword in one hand,, 
and the banner of the expedition in the other, Columbus 
landed, with his followers, and in the midst of the gorgeous 
(f^£Sr scenery and the incense of myriads of flowers, they all knelt 

(T I down and chaunted a hymn of thanksgiving to God. The 

natives had gathered in wonder and awe, in the grove near 
by, regarding the Europeans as children of their great 
deity, the Sun.^ Little did they comprehend the fatal signif- 
icance to them, of the act of Columbus, when, rising from 
the ground, he displayed the royal standard, drew his sword, 
set up a rude cross upon the spot where he landed, and took 
formal possession of the beautiful country in the name of 
Ferdinand and Isabella.^ The land first discovered by Colum- 
bus was one of the Bahamas, called by the natives Guana- 
hama, but since named by the English, Cat Island. The 
navigator named it San Salvador (Holy Saviour) ; and believing it to be near 
the coast of further India, he called the natives Indians. This name was after- 
ward applied to all the natives of the adjacent continent,^ and is still retained. 

The triumph of Columbus was now complete. After spending some time 
in examining the island, becoming acquamted with the simple habits of the- 
natives, and unsuccessfully searching for "the gold, and pearls, and spices of 
Zipangi,"^ he sailed southward, and discovered several other small islands. He 
finally discovered Cuba and St. Domingo, where he was told of immense gold- 
bearing regions in the interior. Impressed with the belief that he had dis- 
covered the Ophir of the ancients, ho returned to Spain, where he arrived ic 
March, 1-1:93. He was received with great honors,' but considerations of State- 
policy induced the Spanish government to conceal the importance of his dis- 
covery from other nations. This policy, and the jealousy Avhich the sudden 
elevation of a foreigner inspired in the Spaniards, deprived him of the honor 
of having the New World called by his name. Americus Vespucius," a Flor- 
entine, unfairly won the prize. In company with Ojeda, a companion of Colum- 



■ Almost all the natives of the torrid zone of America worshiped the sun as the chief visible- 
deity. The great temples of the sun in Mexico and Peru were among the most magnificent struc- 
tures of the Americans, when Eiu-opeans came. 

- It was fi common practice tlien, as now, for the discoverer of new lands to erect some monu- 
ment, and to proclaim the title of his sovereign to the territories so discovered. The banner of the 
expedition, borne on shore by Columbus, was a white one, with a green cross. Over the mitial*. 
F. and Y. (Ferdinand and Ysabella) were golden mural crowns. 

' Chapter I, page 9. _ « Note 4, page 38. 

^ ColumlDus carried back with him several of the natives, and a variety of the animals, birds,, 
and plants of the New World. Tiiey excited the greatest astonishment. His journey from Palos 
to Barcelona, to meet the sovereigns, was like the march of a king. His reception was still more 
magnificent. The throne of the monarch was placed in a pubhc square, and the great of the king- 
dom were there to do homage to the navigator. The highest honors were bestowed upon Colum- 
bus ; and the sovereigns granted him a coat of arms bearing royal devices, and the motto, " To- 
Castile and Leon Columbus gave a new world." 

6 See tlie protrait of Vespucius at the head of this Chapter. The Italians spell his name Amer- 
igo Vespucci [Am-e-ree-go Ves-pute-se]. He died while in the service of the king of Spain, in 
1514. He had made several voyages to South America, and explored the eastern coast as Car- 
southward as the harbor of Rio Janeiro. 



3609.1 SPANISH VOYAGES AND DISCOYERIES. 41 

bus during his first voyage, Amcricus visited the West Indies, and discovered 
and explored the eastern coast of South America, north of the Oronoco, in 
1499. In 1504, he published a glowing account of the lands he had visited,' 
and that being the first formal announcement to the world of the great discov- 
ery, and as he claimed to have first set foot upon the Continent of the West, 
it was called America, in honor of the Florentine. This claim was not 
founded on truth, for Columbus had anticipated him ; and two years earlier, 
Cabot, in command of an expedition from England, discovered Labrador, New- 
foundland, and portions of the New England coast. 

Columbus made three other voyages to the West Indies, ^ established settle- 
ments, and in August, 1498, he discovered the continent at the mouth of the 
Oronoco. This, too, he supposed to be an island near the coast of Asia, and he 
lived and died in ignorance of the real grandeur of his discoveries. Before 
departing on his third voyage, he was appointed Viceroy and High Admiral of 
the New World. During his absence, jealous and unscrupulous men poisoned 
the minds of the king and queen with false statements concerning the ambitious 
designs of Columbus, and he was sent back to Spain in chains. The navigator 
was guilty of serious wrongs, but not against his sovereign. He made slaves 
of the natives, and this offended the conscientious Isal)ella. But she was soon 
undeceived concerning his alleged political crimes, and he was allowed to depart 
on a fourth voyage. When he returned, the queen was dead, his enemies were 
in power, and he who had shed such luster upon the Spanish name, and added a 
new hemisphere to the Spanish realm, was allowed to sink into the grave in 
obscurity and neglect. He died at Yalladolid on the 20th of May, 1506. 
His body was buried in a convent, from whence it was afterward carried to St. 
Domingo, and subsequently to Havana, m Cuba, where it now remains. 

It was an unlucky hour for the nations of the New World when the eyes of 
Europeans Avere first opened upon it. The larger islands of the West India 
group were soon colonized by the Spaniards ; and the peaceful, friendly, gen- 
tle, and happy natives, were speedily reduced to slavery. Their Paradise was 
made a Pandemonium for them. Bending beneath the weight of Spanish 
cruelty and wrong, they soon sunk into degradation. The women were com- 
pelled to intermarry with their oppressors, and from this union came many of 
the present race of Creoles, who form the numerical strength of Cuba and other 
West India Islands. 

The wonderful stories of gold-bearing regions, told by the natives, and ex- 
aggerated by the adventurers, inflamed the avarice and cupidity of the Span- 
iards, and exploring voyages from Cuba, St. Domingo, and Porto Rico, were 
undertaken. The eastern coast of Yucatan Avas discovered in 1506 ; and 
in 1510, Vasco Nunez de Balboa, with a colony, settled upon the Isthmus 



' First in a letter to Lorenzo de Medici, and then [150'7] in a volume, dedicated to the Duke of 
Lorraine. These publications revealed what the Spanish Government wished to conceal. Note 4, 
page 47. 

2 In his second voyage [1493], Coluraljus took with him several horses, a bull, and some cows. 
These wore the first animals of the kind taken from Europe to America- 




42 DISCOVERIES. [1492. 

•of Darien. This was the first colony planted on the continent of America. 
Crossing the Isthmus in search of gold in 1513, Balboa saw the Pacific 
Ocean in a southerly direction from the top of a high 
mountain, and he called it the " South Sea." In fill] 
costume, and bearing the Spanish flag, he entered its 
waters and took possession of the "seas, lands," etc., "of 
the South," in the name of his sovereign. 

In the year 1512 Florida was discovered by Juan Ponce 
de Leon, an old visionary, who had been governor of 
Porto Rico. With three ships he sailed for the Bahamas 
in search of a fountain which unlettered natives and 
wise men of Spain believed to exist there, and whose 

■^S^.: r_ waters possessed the quality of restoring old age to' the 

BALiioA.i bloom of youth, and of making the recipient immortal. 

It was on Easter Sunday,^ March 27, 1512, the Pasquas de Flores^ of the 
Spaniards, when the adventurer approached the shores of the great southern 
peninsula of the United States and landed near the site of St. Augustine.* The 
forests and the green banks were laden with flowers ; and when, soon after 
landing, Ponce de Leon took possession of the country in the name of his sov- 
ereign, this fact and the holy day were regarded, and he called the beautiful 
domain, Florida. He continued his searches for the Fountain of Youth all 
along the coast of the newly-discovered country, and among the Tortugas (Tor- 
toise) Islands, a hundred miles from its southern cape, but without success ; 
ajid he returned to Porto Bico, an older if not a Aviser man. He soon afterward 
went to Spain, where he remained several years. 

While Ponce de Leon was absent in Europe, some wealthy owners of plant- 
ations and mines in St. Domingo, sent Lucas Vasquez d'Ayllon, one of their 
number, with two vessels, to seize natives of the Bermudas, and bring them 
home for laborers. It was an unholy mission, and God's displeasure was made 
manifest. A storm drove the voyagers into St. Helen's Sound, on the coast of 
South Carolina, and after much tribulation, they anchored [1520] at the mouth 
of the Combahee Biver. The natives were kind and generous ; and, judging 
their visitors by their own simple standard of honor, they unsuspectingly went 
upon the ship in crowds, to gratify their curiosity. While below, the hatches 
were closed, the sails were immediately spread, and those free children of the 
forest were borne away to work as bond-slaves in the mines of St. Domingo. 
But the perpetrators of the outrage did not accomplish their designs. One of 
the vessels was destroyed by a storm ; and almost every prisoner in the other 
refused to take food, and died. The fruit of this perfidy was a feeling of hos- 
tility to white people, which spread throughout the whole of the Mobilian 
tribes,^ and was a source of much trouble afterward. 



1 This little picture gives a correct representation of those armed Spaniards who attempted con- 
quests in the New "World. Balboa's fellow-adventurers became jealous of his fame, and on their 
accusations he was put to death by the Governor of Darien, in 1517. 

- The day in which is commemorated in the Ciiristian Church the resurrection of Jesus Clirist. 

* Feast of flowers. * Page 51. " Chapter VIII., page 29. 



f609.] SPANISH VOYAGES AND DISCOVERIES. 43 

Ponce cle Leon returned to the West Indies soon after D'Ayllon's voyage, 
bearing the commission of Governor of Florida, with instructions to plant settle- 
ments tliere. In his attempts to do so, the angry natives, who had heard of the 
treachery of the Spaniards, attacked him furiously. He was mortally wounded, 
and almost all of his followers were killed. D' Ayllon was then appointed governor 
of the country which he had discovered and named Chicora. He went thither 
to conquer it, and was received with apparent friendship by the natives on the 
banks of the Combahee,' near the spot where his great crime of man-stealing 
had been perpetrated. Many of his men were induced to visit a village in the 
interior, when the natives practiced the lesson of treachery Avhich D'Ayllonhad 
taught them, and massacred the whole party. The commander himself was 
attacked upon his own ship, and it was with difficulty that he escaped. He died 
of his wounds at St. Domingo. 

Another important discovery was made in 1517, by Francisco Fernandea 
de Cordova, who commanded an expedition from Cuba : the rich and populous 
domain of Mexico was revealed to the avaricious Spaniards. Cordovas report 
of a people half civilized, and possessing treasures in cities, awakened the keen. 
est cupidity of his countrymen ; and the following year Velasquez, the governoi 
of Cuba, sent another expedition to Mexico, under Juan de Grijalva. That 
captain returned with much treasure, obtained by trafficking with the Mex- 
icans. The avarice, cupidity, and ambition of Velasquez were powerfully 
aroused, and he determined to conquer the Mexicans, and possess himself 
of their sources of wealth. An expedition, consisting of eleven vessels, and 
more than six hundred armed men, was placed under the command of Fernando 
Cortez, a brave but treacherous and cruel leader. He landed first at Tobasco, 
and then at San Juan de Ulloa,"^ near Vera Cruz [April 12. 1519], where he 
received a friendly deputation from Montezuma, the emperor of the nation.' 
By falsehood and duplicity, Cortez and his armed companions were allowed to 
march to Mexico, the capital. By stratagem and boldness, and the aid of 
native tribes who were hostile to tlie Mexican dynasty, Cortez^ succeeded, after 
many bloody contests during almost two years, in subduing the people. The 
city of Mexico surrendered to him on the 23d of August, 1521, and the vast 
and populous empire of Montezuma became a Spanish province. 

Florida continued to command the attention of the Spaniards, in whose 
minds floated magnificent dreams of immense wealth in cities and mines within 
its deep forests ; and seven years after the conquest of Mexico [1528], Pamphilo 



' D'AylloTi named this river, Jordan, for he regarded the country as the new Land of Promise. 

^ Pronounced San-whahn-da-OoIoo-ali. 

^ Tiie Mexicans at that time were mailing rapid advances in the march of civilization. They 
were acquainted with many of the useful arts of enlightened nations, and appear to have Iwen as 
far advanced in science, law, religion, and domestic and public social organization, as were the 
Romans at the close of the Republic. 

* Born at Medellon, in Estramadura, Spain, in 1485. He went to St. Domingo in 1504, and 
in 1511 accompanied Velasquez to Cuba. He committed many horrid crimes in Mexico. Yet he 
had the good tbrtune, unhke the more noble Columbus, to retain the favor of the Spanish monarch 
until liis death. When, on his return to Spain, he urged an audience with the emperor, and was 
asked who he was, the bold adventurer replied, " I am the man who has given you more provinces 
than your father left you towns." He died in Estramadura, m 1554, at the age of 69 years. 



44 DISCOVERIES. [1492, 

de Narvaez having been appointed governor of that region, went from Cuba., 
with three hundred men,' to conquer it. Hoping to find a wealthy empire, 
like Mexico, he penetrated the unknown interior as far as the southern borders- 
of Georgia. Instead of cities filled with treasures, he found villages of huts, 
and the monarch of the country living in a wigAvam.'' Disappointed, and con- 
tinually annoyed by hostile savages, who had heard of the treachery at the Com- 
bahee," he turned southward, and reaching the shores of Apallachee Bay, near 
St. Marks, he constructed rude boats and embarked for Cuba. The commander 
and most of his followers perished ; only four escaped, and these wandered from 
tribe to tribe for several yeai-s before reaching a Spanish settlement in Mexico. 
Yet the misfortunes of Narvaez did not suppress the spirit of adventure, and 
Florida (the name then applied to all North America) was still regarded by^ 
the Spaniards as the new Land of Promise. All believed that in the vast 
interior were mines as rich, and people as wealthy as those of Mexico and Yu- 
catan. Among the most sanguine of the possessors of such 
an opinion, was Ferdmand de Soto, a brave and Avealthy 
cavalier, who had gained riches and military honors, with 
Pizarro, in Peru.^ He obtained permission of the Spanish 
emperor to conquer Florida at his own expense, and for that 
purpose, was appointed governor of Cuba, and also of Flor- 
i(^a. With ten vessels and six hundred men, all clad in 
armor, he sailed for the New World early in 1539. Leav- 
DE SOTO. ing his wife to govern Cuba, he proceeded to Florida, and. 

on the 10th of June landed on the shores of Tampa Bay, 
He then sent most of his vessels back, and made his way, among hostile sav- 
ages, toward the interior of the fancied land of gold.^ He wintered on the 
banks of the Flint River, in Georgia, and in the spring crossed the Appal- 
lachian Mountains, and penetrated the beautiful country of the Cherokees.^ 

This, all things considered, Avas one of the most remarkable expeditions on 
record. For several months, De Soto and his followers wandered over the hills, 
and valleys of Alabama, in vain searches for treasure, fighting the fierce Mo- 
bilian tribes,' and becoming continually diminished in number by battle and 
disease. They passed the winter of 1541 on the banks of the Yazoo River, in 
the land of the Chickasaws.* In May of that year, they discovered and crossed 
the Mississippi River, probably not far below Memphis ; and there, in the pres- 
ence of almost twenty thousand Indians, De Soto erected a cross made of a 
huge pine tree, and around it imposing religious* ceremonies were performed. 

' They took with them about forty horses, the first ever landed upon the soil of the present 
United States. These all perished by starvation, or the weapons of the Indians. 

2 Page 13. ' Page 42. 

* Pizarro was a follower of Balboa. He discovered Peru in 1524, and in connection with Al- 
magro and Lucque, he conquered it in 1532, after much bloodshed. He was born, out of wedlock, 
in Estramadura, Spain, in 1475. He could neither read nor write, but seemed eminently fitted for 
the field of effort in which he was enij^aged. He quarreled with Almagro, civil war ensued, and h© 
was murdered at Lima, in Peru, in 1541. 

5 De Soto had a large number of horses. He also landed some swine. These rapidly increased. 
in the forests. They were the first of their species seen in America. 

« Page 27 i Chapter VIII., p. 29. 8 Page 30. 








^^ 



BIE S®!?® ©sr ^niDI; 



jrMIE HI 



1609.] ENGLISH AND FRENCH DISCOVERIES. 45 

To De Soto belongs the honor of first discovering that mightj river of our wide 
continent. After resting two days, the adventurers went up the western shore 
of the Mississippi as far as New Madrid. The ensuing summer and winter 
were spent by them in the wilderness watered by the Arkansas and its tributa- 
ries, and m the spring of 1542 they returned to the Mississippi, at the mouth 
of the Wachita, where De Soto sickened and died, after appointing his succes- 
sor.' In these painful and perilous journeyings, they had marched full three 
thousand miles. 

The death of their leader was a terrible blow to the followers of De Soto. 
They were now reduced to half their original number : and, abandonino- all 
hopes of finding gold, or a Avealthy people, they sought for Spanish settlements 
in Mexico. For many months they wandered over the prairies, and among the 
tributary streams of the Red River, as far as the land of the Comanches," when 
impassable mountain ranges compelled them to retrace their steps to the Mis- 
sissippi. At a little below Natchez they remained until the following July 
[1543], engaged in constructing several large boats, in which they embarked. 
Reaching the Gulf of Mexico, they crept cautiously along its coast ; and, on the 
20th of September, the little remnant of De Soto's proud army, half naked and 
starving, arrived at a Spanish settlement near the mouth of the Panuco, thirty 
miles north of Tampico. This was the last attempt of the Spanish cotempo- 
xaries of Columbus to explore, or to make settlements within the present terri- 
tory of the United States, previous to the appearance of the English' in the 
same field. They were impelled by no higher motive than the acquisition of 
gold, and treachery anci violence Avere the instruments employed to obtain it. 
They were not worthy to possess the magnificent country which they coveted 
only for its supposed wealth in 1 recious metals ; and it was reserved for others, 
who came afterward, with loftier aims, better hearts, and stronger hands, to 
cultivate the soil, and to establish an empire fi)unded upon truth and justice. 
The Spaniards did finally become possessors of the southern portion of the Con- 
tinent ; and to this day the curse of moral, religious, and political despotism 
rests upon those regions. 



CHAPTER III. 

ENGLISH AND Fr.ENCTI DISCOTERTES. 

With all its zealous vigilance, the Spanisli court could not conceal the fact 
that a New World had been discovered,' and over Continental Europe and the 

1 De Soto's followers sunk the body of their leader deep in tlie Mississippi, so that the Indians 
should not find it. 2 Page 33. 

^ Page 46. "While De Soto was engaged in this expedition, another, no less adventurous, was 
undertaken by Coronada, at the command of Mendoza, Viceroy of Mexico. He took with hun, 
from the south-eastern shore of the Gulf of California, three hundred and fifty Spaniards, and eight 
hundred Indians. He penetrated the country to the head waters of the Rio del Norte, and onward 
into the great interior desert, as far as the fortieth degree of north latitude. It was a perilous, but 
iruitless expedition. < Page 40. 




46 DISCOVERIES. [1492, 

British Isles, were spread the most extravagant tales of gold-bearing regions 
beyond the Atlantic Ocean. By means of a papal hull^^ Portugal and Spain 
vainly attempted to secure to themselves a monopoly of oceanic navigation. 
But in all maritime countries, cupidity and curiosity urged men to brave both 
the perils of the sea and the thunders of the Vatican, in search of the western 
paradise and the regions of gold. Monarchs and wealthy subjects projected 
new expeditions. Among those whose zeal in the cause of maritime discovery 
was newly awakened, was Henry the Seventh of England, who had turned a 
deaf ear to the appeals of Columbus before his great first voyage.'^ 

The town of Bristol, in the west of England, was 
then one of the most important sea-ports in the realm ; 
and among its adventurous mariners who had pene- 
trated the polar waters, probably as far as Greenland, 
was Sebastian Cabot, son of a wealthy Venetian mer- 
chant of Bristol, whose father sought the aid of the 
king in making a voyage of discovery. Willing to 
secure a portion of the prize he had lost, Henry read- 
ily yielded to the solicitations of Cabot, and gave him 
SEBASTIAN CABOT. ^^^1 his SOUS a commissiou of discovery, dated March 

16, 1496, which was similar, in some respects, to that 
which Columbus had received from Ferdinand and Isabella;' but unlike his 
Spanish cotemporaries, the English monarch did not bear the expenses of the 
voyage. The navigators were permitted to go, at their own expense, " to search 
for islands or regions inhabited by infidels, and hitherto unknown to Christen- 
dom," and take possession of them in the name of the King of England. They 
were to enjoy the sole right of trading thither — paying to the King, ' ' in lieu 
of all customs and imposts," a fifth of all net profits, and the same proportion 
of the products of all mines. 

According to recent discoveries made in searching the ancient records of 
England, it appears to be doubtful whether the elder Cabot, who was a mer- 
chant and a scientific man, ever voyaged to America. It is certain, however, 
that his son, Sebastian, accompanied, and, doubtless, commanded, the first 
expedition, which consisted of two vessels freighted by his father and others of 
Bristol and of London, and which sailed from the former port in May, 1498. 
They steered north-westerly until they encountered immense fields of ice west- 
ward of Cape FareAvell, when they turned to the south-west, and on the 3d of 
July, of that year, discovered the rugged coast of Labrador. Passing Cape 
Charles, they saw Newfoundland ; and, after touching at several points, prob- 
ably as far southward as the coast of Maine, they hastened to England to 
announce the fact that they had first discovered a great western continent. 

> This is the name of special edicts issued by the Pope of Rome. They are written on parch- 
ment, and have a great seal attached, made of wax, lead, silver, or gold. The name is derived from 
the seal, luUa. On one side, are tlie heads of Peter and Paul, and on the other, the name of the Pope 
and the year of his pontificate. Tlie seal of the celebrated golden hull of the Emperor Charles IV., 
was made of gold. That bull became the fundamental law of the German Empire, at the Diet of 
Nuremburg, A. d. 1536. 2 Page 37. ^ jSTote 1, page 39. 



1609.] ENGLISH AND FRENCH DISCOVERIES. 47 

The skill and energy of young Cabot secured the confidence of his father- 
and friends in his ability to command successfully ; and the following year, 
although he was only twenty-one years of age, he was placed in charge of 
another expedition, fitted out by his family and some Bristol merchants, for the 
purpose of trafiic, and of discovering a north-west passage to India, a desire for 
which had now taken hold upon the minds of the commercial world. Ice in the 
polar seas presented an impassable barrier, and he was compelled to go south- 
ward. He explored the coast from the frozen regions of Labrador to the sunny 
land of the Carolinas. Nineteen years afterward [1517] he navigated the 
northern waters, as far as the entrance to Hudson's Bay ; and nine years later 
[1526], while in the service of the monarch of Spain, ^ he explored the coast of 
Brazil, discovered and named the great Hio de la Plata, and penetrated the 
southern continent, in boats, upon the bosom of that river, almost four hundred 
miles. To the Cabots, father and son, belong the imperishable honor of first 
discovering the coast of the United States, through at least ten degrees of lati- 
tude. .Italy may claim the glory of having given birth to the two great discov- 
erers, Columbus and Americus Vespucius, whose name our continent now 
bears ; while Sebastian Cabot drew his first breath in England. ^ 

The immense numbers and commercial importance of the cod fishes in th& 
vicinity of Newfoundland, were first discovered and made known by the Cabots ; 
and within five or six years after their first voyages, many fishermen went 
thither from England, Brittany, and Normandy, for those treasures of the deep. 
Every French vessel that went to America, was on a com- 
mercial errand only, until 1523, when Francis the first fitted 
out four ships, for the purpose of exploring the coasts of the 
New World. He gave the command to John Verrazani, an 
eminent Florentine navigator. Verrazani sailed in Decem- 
ber, 1523, but a tempest disabled three of his ships, and he 
was compelled to go with only one. He proceeded due west / 
from the Madeiras on the 27th of January, 1524, and first 
touched the American Continent, in March following, near terrazani. 

the mouth of the Cape Fear River, in North Carolina. After 
seeking a good harbor for fifty leagues further south, he sailed northward, and 

' Sebastian Cabot was bom at Bristol, in 1467. He was invested with the honorable title of 
Chief Pilot of both England and Spain : and to him England is indebted for her first maritime con- 
nection with Russia, by the establishment- of the Russian Trading Company, of which he was 
appointed governor for life. He published a map of the world, and also an account of his southern 
voyages. He died in 1557, at the age of 90 years. 

2 King John of Portugal, like Henry of England, had r "used to aid Columbus, and lost the 
great prize. After the return of the navigator, he felt a desire to fit out an expedition for dis- 
coveries in the New World, but the Pope having given to Spain the whole region westward, 
beyond an imaginary line three hundred leagues west from the Azores, he dared not interfere with 
the Spanish mariners. But when the northern voyages of the Cabots became known, King John 
dispatched an expedition in that direction, under Gasper Cortoreal, toward the close of the year 
1500, for the ostensible purpose of seeking a north-west passage to India. Cortoreal coasted along 
the shores of Labrador several hundred miles, and then freighting his ship with fifty natives whom 
he had caught, he returned to Portugal, and sold his living cargo, for slaves. Finding the adven- 
ture profitable, he sailed for another cargo, but he was never heard of afterward. Almost sixty 
years later some Portuguese settled in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, and first imported cattl* 
and swme there. 




48 



DISCOVERIES. 



[1492. 




c\rtier\s ship. 



explored the coast from the Carolinas to Newfoundland. He anchored in the 
Bays of Delaware and New York,' the harbor of Newport, and probably that 
of Boston, and held intercourse with the natives, who were sometimes friendly 
and sometimes hostile. Verrazani gave the name of New France to the vast 
regions within the latitudes of the coasts which he had discovered. But at that 
time the French King was too much engrossed and impoverished by war with 
the Spanish monarch, to pay much attention to the 
important discoveries of Verrazani, or to listen to plans 
for future expeditions. Ten years elapsed before Admi- 
ral Chabon induced Francis to encourage another explor- 
ing enterprise, Avhen a plan for making settlements in 
New France was arranged [lo34j, and James Cartier, a 
mariner of St. Malo, was appointed to the command of 
an expedition. He reached Newfoundland early in 
June, 1534. After exploring its coasts, 
he passed through the Straits of Belle- 
isle, into the Gulf beyond, planted a 
cross with the arms of France upon it, on the shore of Gaspc 
inlet, and took possession of the Avhole country in the name of 
his king. After discovering the mouth of the great river of 
Canada, he sailed for France, in time to avoid the autumn 
storms on the American coast. 

There was great joy at the French court, in the capital, 
and throughout the whole kingdom, because of the success of 
Cartier. He was commissioned for another voyage ; and in 
May following [1535] he sailed for Newfoundland Avith three 
ships, accompanied by several young noblemen of France. 
They passed the Straits of Belleisle, and entered the Gulf on the day dedicated 
to St. Lawrence ; and, on that account, Cartier gave the name of the martyr to 
the broad sheet of water over which they were sailing. They passed up the 
river which afterward received the same name, and mooring their ships at Que- 
bec,'^ proceeded in a pinnace and boats to Hochelaga, where Montreal now 
stands, then the capital of the Huron king.^ The natives were everywhere 
friendly and hospitable. 

The land in all that region was very level, except a high mountain in the 
rear of the Indian town. Cartier ascended to its summit, and was so impressed 
with the glorious view that he called it INIont-Real (royal mountain), which 
name the fine city at its base yet retains. After exchanging presents and 
friendly salutations with the Indians, they returned to Quebec, and passed the 
severe winter on board their ships. In the spring, after setting up a cross, and 




ARMS OF FRANCE. 



' Some authors say that Verrazani landed where the louver extremity of New York city is, and 
giving the natives some spirituous liquors, made many of them drunk. The Indians called the 
place Manna-ha-ta, or "place of dnmkenness," and they were afterward called Manna-ha-tans. 
But this scene of intoxication probably occurred on board the Half-Moon, the exploring ship of 
Hendrick Hudson, See page 59. ^ Pronounced Ke-bec. 3 page 23. 




1609.] ENGLISH AND FRENCH DISCOVERIES. 49 

taking formal possession of the country, thej returned to France, having lost 
twenty-five seamen Avith the scurvy, a disease until then unknown. Their de- 
parture was disgraced by an act of treachery, which planted the seeds of hatred 
of the white people among the natives of the St. Lawrence. Cartier, under 
pretense of friendship, decoyed the hospitable Huron king on board one of his 
vessels and carried him off to France. 

The results of this voyage were little else than a series 
of disappointments. Cartier's report of the rigors of the win- 
ter and the barrenness of the land in precious stones and 
metals, was discouraging, and four years elapsed before an- 
other expedition was planned. At length, Francis de la 
Roque, better known as lord of Robertval, in Picardy, ob- 
tained permission of the king to make further discoveries, and 
to plant settlements in New France.' The king invested 
him with the empty title of Viceroy of the whole country. 
Cartier's services being indispensable, he, too, Avas commis- 
sioned, but for subordinate command. He was ready hmy ^„^,-„„ ,-, ,„ ^„ ., 

' _ _ «/ O FRE^CH >OBLEMAX 

before Robertval's extensive preparations were completed, i^ 1540. 

and being unwilling to bow to the new Viceroy's authority, 
he sailed, with five ships, in June, 1541, some months before the departure of 
his official superior. He had intended to take the Huron king back with him, 
but the broken-hearted monarch had died in France. It Avas an unfortunate 
occurrence. The natives received Cartier first Avith coldness, and then showed 
open hostility. Fearing the Indians, the French built a fort upon the island 
of Orleans, a little below Quebec. There they passed the winter without 
accomplishing any important achievement, and in June folloAving [1542], de- 
parted for France, just as Robertval arriA^ed at NcAvfoundland, with tAvo hun- 
dred persons. Robertval passed up the St. LaAvrence, built tAvo more forts 
near Quebec, endured a Avinter of great distress, and, abandoning the idea of 
settlement, returned to France in the spring of 1543. Six years afterward, he 
again sailed for the St. LaAvrence, and was never heard of again. The discov- 
eries of Verrazani and Cartier, and also of French fishermen, served as the found- 
ation for a claim by France to the northern portion of the American continent. 
France was noAV convulsed by the conflicts of religious opinions. It was 
the era of the Reformation there. '^ The doctrines and the teachings of Calvin 
and others, in opposition to the faith and practice of the Roman Catholic 
Church, had already arrayed great masses of the people in violent hostility to 
each other. The religious Avar Avas an absorbing idea, and for fifty years the 
French gOA^ernment made no further attempts at discovery or colonization. 
But private enterprise sought to plant a French settlement in the land discovered 
by D'Ayllon.^ The Huguenots, or French Protestants, who maintained the 
faith of early Christianity, Avere the Aveaker party in number, and felt the heaAy 
heel of oppression. They had a poAverful friend in Jasper Coligny, admiral of 
France, but a weak protector in the reigning monarch, Charles the Ninth. 

J Page 48. . 2 Note 14, page 62. 3 Page 42 



50 DISCOVERIES. [1492. 

The fires of persecution were continuallj burning, and at length Coiignj 
conceived the noble idea of providing a place of refuge for his Protestant 
brethren, beyond the Atlantic. The king granted him a commission for that 
purpose ; and earlj in 1562 [Feb. 28 J, a squadron, under John Ribault, 
sailed for America. The little Huguenot fleet touched first near the harbor 
of St. Augustine, in Florida.' Sailing northward, they saw the mouth of the 
beautiful St. John's River [May, 1562], and, it being the fifth month of the 
year, they named it the " River of May." Making their way along the coast, 
they discovered Port Royal entrance, were charmed with the beauty of the 
scene, chose the spot for their future home, and built a small fort, which they 
named Carolina, in honor of the king. Leaving a garrison of twenty-six men 
to defend it, Ribault went back to France with the ships, for reinforcements. 
Bitter disappointment ensued. Civil war was raging in France, and Coligny 
was almost powerless. The reinforcements were not supplied, and the little 
garrison, though treated with hospitality by the Indians, became very discon- 
tented. Despairing of relief, they built a frail vessel, and, with insufiicient 
stores, they embarked for France. Tempests assailed them, and famine was 
menacing them with death, when they were picked up by an English bark, and 
conveyed to Great Britain. Thus perished the first seeds of religious freedom 
•which the storms of persecution bore to the New World. 

The noble Coligny was not discouraged ; and, during a lull in the tempest 
of civil commotion, another expedition was sent to America, under the com- 
mand of Laudonniere, who had accompanied Ribault on his first voyage. 
They arrived in July, 1564, pitched their tents on the banks of the St. John's 
River (River of May), and built another Fort Carolina. But there were ele- 
ments of dissolution among these immigrants. Many were idle, vicious, and 
improvident ; and provisions soon became scarce. Under pretext of returning 
to France, to escape famine, quite a large party sailed, in December, in one of 
the vessels. They turned pirates, and depredated extensively upon Spanish 
property in the West Indies. The remainder became discontented, and Avere 
about to embark for France, when Ribault arrived with immigrants and sup- 
plies, and took command.^ 

Spanish jealousy and bigotry were now aroused, and when the monarch of 
Spain, the narrow Philip the Second, heard of the settlement of the French 
Protestants within his claimed territory, and of the piracies of some of the 
party, he adopted measures for their expulsion and punishment. Pedro Melen- 
dez, a brave but cruel military chief, was appointed Governor of Florida, on 
condition that he would expel the Frenchmen from the soil, conquer the natives, 
and plant a colony there within three years. That was an enterprise exactly 
suited to the character of Melendez. He came with a strong force, consisting 
of three hundred soldiers, furnished by the king, and twenty-two hundred vol- 

1 Page 42. 

2 James Le Moyne, a skillful painter, was sent with this expedition, with instructions to mako 
colored drawings of every object worthy of preservation. His illustrations of the costume and cus- 
toms of the natives are very interestmg, because authentic. 



J609.] ENGLISH AND FRENCH DISCOVERIES. 51 

unteers — priests, sailors, mechanics, laborers, women, and children. The fleet 
was scattered bj storms, and with onlj one third of his original number, Me- 
Jendez landed in a fine harbor on the coast of 'Florida. There he laid the 
foundations of a city, which he named St. Augustine [Sept. 17, 1565], and 
formally proclaimed the king of Spain to be monarch of all North America. 
On hearing of the arrival of the Spaniards, a large party of the French, under 
Ribault, proceeded from the St. John's, bj water, to attack them. A tempest 
wrecked every vessel ; and most of the survivors, who fell into the hands of the 
Spaniards, were put to death. In the mean while, Melendez made his way- 
through the swamps and forests Avith a strong force, to the defenseless French 
■settlement, where he massacred about nine hundred men, women, and children, 
and over their dead bodies placed an inscription, avowing that he slew them, not 
" because they were Frenchmen, but Lutherans.'" Upon that field of blood 
the monster erected a cross, and laid the foundation of a Christian church to 
commemorate the deed ! 

Charles the Ninth of France was not only a weak monarch, but an enemy 
to the Huguenots. He therefore took no steps to avenge the outrage, per- 
petrated under the sanction of the bigot of Spain. But one of his subjects, a 
fiery soldier of Gascony, named Dominic de Gourges, obtained permission to 
inflict retribution. He had suffered Spanish bondage and Spanish cruelty, and 
panted for revenge. He fitted out three ships at his own expense, and with one 
hundred and fifty men, sailed for Florida. He attacked the Spaniards upon the 
St. John's, surprised and captured Fort Carolina, which they occupied, made 
two hundred prisoners, and hanging his captives upon the trees almost upon the 
spot where his countrymen had been murdered, he placed over them the inscrip- 
tion — " I do not this as unto Spaniards or mariners, but unto traitors, robbers, 
and murderers." Too weak to brave the vengeance of ]\Ielendez, who was at St. 
Augustine, De Gourges immediately left the coast, and returned to France. 
The natives were delighted at seeing their common enemies thus destroy- 
ing each other. The Spaniards, however, held possession, and a Spanish 
settlement was ever afterward maintained at St. Augustine, except during a 
few years. 

It was now more than three quarters of a century since Columbus discov- 
ered the West India Islands, and yet no real progress toward a permanent 
European settlement, within the domain of the United States, had been made. 
Although the English seem not to have wholly relinquished the idea of plant- 
ing settlements in America, it was not until the twentieth year of the brilliant 
reign of Queen Elizabeth, and almost eighty years after the discovery of the 
continent by Cabot,- that healthy efforts to found colonies in the New World, 
were made. Sir Martin Frobisher^ (an eminent navigator) and others had 

' The Protestants were often called by the general name of Lutherajis, because the later Reform- 
ation was commenced by the bold opposition of Martin Luther to the corrupt practices of the Romish 
Church. Note 14, page 62. 2 page 46. 

3 Born in Yorkshire, Englnnd ; was trained in the navigator's art ; made several voyages for 
discovery ; and died of wounds received in a naval battle near Brest, on the French coast, ia 
1594. 



52 DISCOVF]RIES. [1492. 

explored the north- estern coast of North America, to the dreary region north 
of Hudson's Bay/ in search of precious metals and a north-west passage to 
India,' but without beneficial results. Newfoundland was visited every year 
by numerous English and French fishing-vessels, and the neighboring continent 
was frequently touched by the hardy mariners. Yet no feasible plans for col- 
onization were matured. Finally, when the public mind of England was turned 
from the cold regions of Labrador and the fancied mineral wealth in its rugged 
mountains, to the milder South, and the more solid benefits to be derived from 
plmitaiions than min s, a new and brilliant era in the history of civilization 
beofan. This change was produced incidentally by the Huguenot adventurers.' 
The remnant of Coligny's first colony, who were picked up at sea and taken to 
England, informed the queen of the glory of the climate, and the fertility of 
the soil of Carolina. When De Gourges returned from his foray upon the 
Spaniards,^ Walter Raleigh, then a young man of much promise, was learning 
the art of war Avith Coligny, in France, and he communicated to his friends in 
England that chevalier's account of Florida, which was yet a wilderness free 
for the sons of toil. Enterprise was powerfully aroused by the promises of that 
warm and beautiful land, and the Protestant^ feeling of England was strongly 
stirred by the cruelties of Melendez. These dissimilar, but auxiliary causes, 
produced great effects, and soon many minds were employed in planning 
schemes for colonizing the pleasant middle regions of North America. The 
first healthy plan for settlement there Avas proposed by the learned Sir Humph- 
rey Gilbert, a step-brother of Walter Raleigh. He had served with honor in 
the wars of Ireland, France, and the Low Countries, and then was not only prac- 
tically engaged in maritime affairs, but had written and published a treatise on 
the north-west passage to India. Having lost money in a vain endeavor to 
transmute baser metals into gold, he resolved to attempt to retrieve his fortune 
by planting a colony in the New World. In June, 1578, he obtained a liberal 
patent or grant from the queen. Raleigh gave him the aid of his hand and for- 
tune ; and early in 1579, Gilbert sailed for America, with a small squadron, 
accompanied by his step-brother. Heavy storms and Spanish war- vessels com- 
pelled them to return, and the scheme was abandoned for a time. Four years 
afterward [1583J Gilbert sailed with another squadron ; and after a series of 
disasters, he reached the harbor of St. John's, NcAvfoundland. There he set up 
a pillar with the English arms upon it,° proclaimed the sovereignty of his 
queen, and then proceeded to explore the coast southward. After being ter- 
ribly beaten by tempests off" the shores of Nova Scotia and Maine, and losing 
his largest ship, he turned his vessel toward England. At midnight, in Sep- 
tember, during a gale, his own little bark of ten tons went down, with all on 
board, and only one vessel of the expedition returned to England to relate the 
dreadful narrative. 

The melancholy fate of the second expedition did not dismay the heart of 

' Note 8, page 59. ' Page 47. ' Page 50. 

* Page 51. ' Note 14, page 62. « Note 2, page 40. 



i'lii 






^^S^ 



^:*^^ 







'"^^^%%^ 



3t a I e i g f) ' § (5 j; p e b i 1 i o n 3 u St o n n o f e . 



1609.] 



ENGLISH AND FRENCH DISCOVERIES. 



55 




Raleigh. He was a young man of great spirit, "the most restless, and am- 
bitious, as he was the most versatile and accomplished, of all Elizabeth's court- 
iers." He now obtained a patent for himself [April, 
1584], which made him lord proprietor of all lands 
that might be discovered bj him in America, be- 
tween the Santee and Delaware Rivers. He dis- 
patched Philip Amidas and Arthur Barlow, with 
two well-furnished ships, to explore the American 
coast. They approached the shores of Carolina' 
in July, and landing upon the islands of Wocoken 
and Roanoke, which separate the waters of Pamlico 
and Albemarle Sounds from the Atlantic, they took 
possession of the country in the name of Elizabeth. raleigh. 

They remained a few weeks, exploring the Sounds and trafficking with tho- 
natives, and then returned to England with two sons of the forest.'' The glow- 
ing accounts of the newly-discovered country filled Raleigh's' heart with joy ; 
and the queen declared the event to be (what it really was) one of the most 
glorious of her reign. In memorial of her unmarried state, she gave the name 
of Virginia to the enchanting region. Raleigh was knighted, his patent was 
confirmed by act of Parliament, and the queen gave him a monopoly in the sale 
of sweet wines, as a means for enriching him. 

The ardent and ever hopeful Raleigh now indulged 
in brilliant dreams of wealth and power to be derived 
from the New World, and he made immediate prepar- 
ations for planting settlements on his- trans- Atlantic 
domains. He dispatched a fleet of seven vessels on 
the 19th of April, 1585, under the command of Sir 
Richard Grenvillc. He was accompanied by Ralph 
Lane, the appointed governor of the colony, with 
learned companions ; and also by Manteo, the native 
chief They narrowly escaped shipwreck on the Caro- 
lina coast, in June, and in consequence of that danger, 

they named the land Avhere their peril Avas greatest, Cape J '^ar. Enterino' 
Ocracock Inlet, they landed upon the island of Roanoke, in Albemarle Sound, 
and there prepared for a permanent residence.'' 




RALEIGH S SHIPS. 



1 The French Protestants had given the name of Carohna to the region wliev'^ tliey attempted 
settlement, and it has ever since retained it. See page 50. 

2 Manko and Wanchese, natives of the adjacent continent: probably of the Hatteras tribe. 

3 Born in Devonshire, England, 1552. He was one of the most illustrious men of tlie reign of 
Queen Ehzabeth, wliieh was remarkable for brilliant minds. His efforts to plant colonies in Amer- 
ica, were evidences of a great genius and indomitable courage and perseverance. He was also a 
fine .'Beholar, as well as a statesman, mariner, and soldier. His name will ever be held in reverence 
by all who can appreciate true greatness. He wrote a History of the "World, while in prison under 
a false charge of high treason, and was beheaded in London, October 29, 1628. 

* The picture of the meeting of the English and natives of Roanoke, on page 53, exhibits 
truthful delineations of the persons and costumes of the Indians found there. They were copied 
and grouped from Harriot's " Brief and True Report of the new found land of Virginia," which was 
published in 1590. Harriot accompanied the expedition as historian and naturalist, remained a. 



56 DISCOVERIES. [1492. 

The English made some fatal mistakes at the outset. Instead of looking to 
the fruition of seed-time for true riches, thej turned from the Avealthj soil upon 
■which thej stood, and went upon vain searches for gold in the forests of the 
adjoining continent. Instead of reciprocating the hospitable friendship of the 
natives, they returned harshness for kindness, and treachery for confidence, 
until a flame of revenge was kindled among the Indians which nothing but the 
blood of Englishmen could quench. Schemes for the destruction of the white 
intruders were speedily planned, and tribes in the interior stood ready to aid 
their brethren upon the seaboard. As soon as Grenville departed with the 
ships, for England, the natives withheld supplies of food, drew the English into 
perilous positions by tales of gold-bearing shores along the Roanoke River, and 
finally reduced the colony to the verge of ruin. At that moment. Sir Francis 
Drake arrived from the West Indies, with his fleet, and afforded them relief. 
But misfortune and fear made them anxious to leave the country, and the emi- 
grants Avere all conveyed to England, in June, 1586, by Drake. A few days 
after their departure, a well-furnished vessel, sent by Raleigh, arrived ; and a 
fortnight later, Grenville entered the inlet with three ships well provisioned. 
After searching for the departed colony, Grenville sailed for England, leaving 
fifteen men upon Roanoke. 

The intrepid Raleigh was still undismayed by misfortune. He adopted a 
wise policy, and instead of sending out mere fortune-hunters,^ he collected a 
band of agriculturists and artisans, with their families, and dispatched them 
[April 26, 1587 J, to found an industrial State in Virginia. He gave them a 
charter of incorporation for the settlement ; and John White, who accompanied 
them, was appointed governor of the colony. They reached Roanoke in July ; 
but instead of the expected greetings of the men left by Grenville, they encoun- 
tered utter desolation. The bones of the fifteen lay bleaching on the ground. 
Their rude tenements were in ruins, and wild deer were feeding in their little 
gardens. They had been murdered by the Indians, and not one was left. 
Manteo^ did not share in the Indian hatred of the white people, and like Massa- 
soit of New England,^ he remained their friend. By command of Raleigh, he 
received Christian baptism, and was invested, by White, with the title of Lord 
of Roanoke., the first and last peerage ever created in America. Yet Manteo 
could not avert nor control the storm that lowered among the Indian tribes, and 
menaced the English with destruction. The colonists were conscious that fear- 
ful perils were gathering, and White hastened to England toward the close of 
the year for reinforcements and provisions, leaving behind him his daughter, 
Eleanor Dare (wife of one of his lieutenants), who had just given birth to a 
child [August 18, 1587], whom they named Virgmla. Virginia Dare was 
the first offspring of English parents born within the territory of the United 
States.* 

year in A'irginia, and had correct drawings made of the inhabitants, their dwellings, their gardens, 
and every thing of interest pertaining to their costumes, custom?, and general characteristics. The 
picture may be acceiDted as historically correct. ' Page 52. ^ Note 2, page 55. 

3 Page 114. ^ Note 6, page 78. 




ENGLISH GENTLE* 



1609.] ENGLISH AND FRENCH DISCOVERIES. 57 

The great Spanish Armada' was preparing for an invasion of Great Britain, 
when White reached England ; and Raleigh, Grenville, and others, were deepl/ 
engaged in public affairs. It was not until the following May 
[1589], that White departed, with two ships, for Virginia. 
According to custom, he went by the way of the West Indies, 
and depredated upon Spanish property found afloat. He was 
beaten in an engagement, lost one of his vessels, and was 
obliged to return to England. Raleigh's fortune being mate- 
rially impaired by his munificence in efforts at colonization, he 
assigned his proprietary rights to others ; and it was not until 
1590 that White Avas allowed to return to Roanoke in search 
of his daughter and the colony he had left. Both had then 
disappeared. Roanoke was a desolation ; and, though Raleigh, 
who had abandoned all thoughts of colonization, had five times 
sent manners, good and true, to search tor the emigrants, ^^jj^ ^ggo. 

they were never found." Eighty years later, the Corees^ told 
the English settlers upon the Cape Fear River, that their lost kindred had been 
adopted by the once powerful Hatteras tribe,* and became amalgamated with 
the children of the wilderness. The English made no further attempts at colo- 
nization at that time ; and so, a century after Columbus sailed for America, 
there was no European settlement upon the North American Continent. Sir 
Francis Drake had broken up the military post at St. Augustine [1585], and 
the Red Men Avere again sole masters of the vast domain. 

A dozen years after the failure of Raleigh's colonization efforts, Bartholo- 
mew Gosnold, who had been to America, and Avas a friend of the late proprietor 
of Virginia, sailed in a small bark [March 26, 1602] directly across the Atlan- 
tic for the American coast. After a voyage of seven AA^eeks, he discovered the 
Continent near Nahant [May 14, 1602], and sailing southAvard, he landed 
upon a sandy point Avliich he named Cape Cod, on account of the great number 
of those fishes in that vicinity. Continuing southAvard, he discovered Nan- 
tucket, Martha's Vineyard, and the group knoAvn as Elizabeth Islands. Upon 
one of them, Avhich he named Elizabeth, in honor of his soA'ereign, Gosnold and 
his company prepared to found a settlement. Upon an islet, in a tiny laKe, 
they built a fort and store-house.^ Becoming alarmed at the menaces of the 
Indians and the want of supplies, they freighted their vessel with sassafras 

' This was a great naval armament, fitted out by Spain, for the invasion of England, in the 
summer of 1588. It consisted of one hundred and fifty ships, two thousand six hundred and fifty 
great guns, and thirty thousand soldiers and sailors. It was defeated [.July 20] by Admirals 
I)rake and Howard. 

2 While Raleigh was making these fruitless searches, the Marquis de la Roche, a wealthy 
JFrench nobleman, attempted to plant a French colony in America. He was commissioned by the 
King of France for the purpose, and in 1598 sailed for America with a colony, chiefly drawn from 
-the prisons of Paris. Upon the almost desert island of Sable, near the coast of Nova Scotia, La 
Roclie left forty men, while he returned to France for supplies. He died soon afterward, and for 
seven years the poor emigrants were neglected. When a vessel was finally sent for them, only 
twelve survived. They were taken to France, their crimes were pardoned by tlie knig, and their 
immediate wants weresupplied. ^ Pagg 20. * Note 5, page 20. 

5 Dr. Jeremy Belknap, the historian of New Hampshire, discovered the cellar of this storehousev 
in 1797. 



58 DISCOYERIES. [1492.- 

roots, and returned to England in June, 1602. The glowing accounts of the 
country which Gosnold gave, awakened the enterprise of some Bristol mer- 
chants,' and the following year [1603] they fitted out two vessels for the pur. 
pose of exploration and traffic with the natives. The command was given to 
Martin Pring, a friend of both Raleigh and Gosnold. Following the track of 
the latter, he discovered the shores of Maine, near the mouth of the Penobscot 
[June], and coasting westward, he entered and explored several of the larger 
rivers of that State. He continued sailing along the coast as far as Martha's 
Vineyard, trading with the natives ; and from that island he returned to En- 
gland, after an absence of only six months. Pring made another voyage to 
Maine, in 1606, and more thoroughly explored the country. Maine was also 
visited in 1605, by Captain George Weymouth, who had explored the coast of 
Labrador, in search of a north-west passage to India.* He entered the Saga- 
dahock, and took formal possession of the country in the name of King James. 
There he decoyed five natives on board his vessel, and then sailed for England. 
These forest children excited much curiosity ; and the narratives of other mari- 
ners of the west of England, who visited these regions at about the same time^ 
gave a new stimulus to colonizing efforts. 

The French now began to turn their attention toward the New World 
again. In 1603, De Monts, a wealthy French Huguenot,^ obtained a commission 
of viceroyalty over six degrees of latitude in New France,* extending from Cape- 
May to Quebec. He prepared an expedition for settlement, and arrived at 
Nova Scotia,' Avith two vessels, in May, 1604.* He passed the summer there, 
trafficking with the natives ; and in the autumn he crossed over to the mouth 
of the St. Croix (the eastern boundary of Maine), and erected a fort there. He 
had left a few settlers at Port Royal (now Annapolis), under Poutrincourt. 
These De Monts joined the following spring [1605], and organized a perma- 
nent colony. He named the place Port Royal ; and the territory now included 
in Nova Scotia, Ncav Brunswick, and the adjacent islands, he called Acadie.'' 
His effijrts promised much success; but he was thwarted by jealous men. In 
1608, he was deprived of his vice-royal commission, when he obtained a grant 
of the monopoly of the fur trade upon the St. Lawrence, for one year, and 
another commission, to plant a colony elsewhere in New France. The new 
expedition Avas placed under the command of Samuel Champlain (who accom- 
panied the viceroy on his first voyage), and on the 3d of June, 1608, he 
arrived, with two vessels, at the mouth of the Saguenay, on the St. Lawrence. 
They ascended the great river, and on the site of Quebec, near where Cartier 
built his fort almost seventy years before,' they planted the first permanent 

' Page 46. ^ Page 510. 3 Page 49. * Page 48. s Xote 2. page 80. 

6 De Monts first brought swine, and other domestic animals, into tliis portion of America. 
Some were also taken from thence to French settlements planted in Canada a few years later. Th» 
company of which he was chief, fitted out four vessels. De Monts commanded "the two here men- 
tioned, assisted by Champlain and Poutrincourt. 

" In 1613, Samuel Argall made a piratical visit to these coasts, under the direction of the gov- 
ernor of the Virginia colony. He destroyed the remnant of De Monts' settlement at St. Croix, 
broke up the peaceful colony at Port Royal, and plundered the people of every thing of value. See 
page 72. . * Page 49. 



1609.] 



ENGLISH AND FRENCH DISCOVERIES. 



5^ 




HENRY HUDSON. 



French settlement in the New World. The following summer, Champlain 
ascended the Richelieu or Sorel River, the outlet of Lake Champlain, with a 
war party of Huron' and Algonquin' Indians, and discovered the beautiful lake 
which bears his name, in the north-eastern part of the State of New York.' 

The English were not idle Avhile the French were 
exploring, and making efforts at settlement in the 
direction of the St. Lawrence. Several private enter- 
prises were in progress, among the most i-uportant of 
which was that of a company of London merchants 
who sent Henry Hudson, an intimate friend of Captain 
Smith,* to search for a supposed north-eastern ocean 
passage to India. He made two unsuccessful voyages 
to the regions of polar ice [1607-8], when the attempt 
was abandoned. Anxious to win the honor of first 
reaching India by the northern seas, Hudson applied 

to the Dutch East India Company' for aid. The Amsterdam directors afforded 
it, and on the 4th of April, 1609, Hudson departed from Amsterdam, in com- 
mand of the Half-Moon, a yacht of eighty tons. He 
Bought a north-eastern passage ; but after doubling the 
capes of Norway, the ice was impassable. Turning his 
prow, he steered across the Atlantic, and first touching 
the continent on the shores of Penobscot Bay, he 
arrived in sight of the capes of Virginia in August, 
1609. Proceeding northward, he entered the mouths 
of several large rivers, and finally passed the Narrows® 
and anchored in New York Bay. He proceeded almost 
sixty leagues up the river that bears his name, and 

according to the formula of the age, took possession of the country in the name 
of the States General of Holland.' He returned to Europe' in November 




' Page 22. 2 Page 17. 

3 Champlain penetrated southward as far as Grown Point ; perhaps south of Ticonderoga. It 
was at about the same time that Hudson went up the river tliat beai's his name, as far as Water- 
ford , so that these eminent navigators, exploring at different points, came very near meeting in the- 
wOderness. Six years afterward Champlain discovered Lake Huron, and there he joined some 
Huron Indians in an expedition against one of the Five Nations in Western New York. They had 
a severe battle in the neighborhood of the present village of Canandaigua. Champlain published 
an account of his first voyage, in IGL'i, and a continuation in 1620. He published a new edition 
of these m 1632, which contains a history of New France, from the discovery of Verrazani to the- 
year 1631. Champlain died in 1634. < Page 65. 

5 Dutch mariners, following the track of the Portuguese, opened a successful traffic with P]ast- 
em Asia, about the year 1594. The various Dutcli adventurers, in the India trade, were united in 
one corporate body in 1602, with a capital of over a million of dollars, to whom were given the 
exclusive privilege of tradmg in the seas east of the Cape of Good Hope. This was the Dutck 
East India Company. 

6 Entrance to New York Bay between Long and Staten Islands. 

■^ This was the title of the Government of Holland, answering, in a degree, to our Congress. 

8 Hudson, while on another voyage in search of a north-west passage, discovered the great Bay 
in the northern regions, which bears his name. He was there frozen in the ice during the winter 
of 1610-11. While endeavoring to make his way homeward in the spring, his crew became muti- 
nous. They finally seized Hudson, bound his arms, and placing him ana his son, and seven sick 
companions, in an open boat, set them adrift upon the cold waters. They were never heard of 
afterward. 



'QO DISCOVERIES. 11492. 

1609, and his report of the goodly hmd he had discovered set in motion those 
■commercial measures ■which resulted in the founding of a Dutch empire in the 
-New World. 

With these discoveries commenced the epoch of settlements. The whole 
Atlantic coast of North America had been thoroughly or partially explored, the 
general character and resources of the soil had become known, and henceforth 
the leading commercial nations of Western Europe — England, France, Spain, 
and Holland — regarded the transat'intic continent, not as merely a rich garden 
■without a Avail, where depredators from every shore might come, and, without 
hinderance, bear away its choicest fruit, but as a land where the permanent 
foundations of vast colonial empires might be laid, from Avliich parent states 
would receive almost unlimited tribute to national wealth and national glory. 

When Ave contemplate these A^oyages across the stormy Atlantic, and con- 
sider the limited geographical knowledge of the navigators, the frailty of their 
vessels^ and equipments, the vast labors and constant privations endured by 
them, and the dangers to which they Avere continually exposed, Ave can not but 
feel the highest respect and reverence for all Avho Avere thus engaged in opening 
the treasures of the Ncav World to the advancing nations of Europe. Although 
acquisitiveness, or the desire for worldly possessions, was the chief incentive to 
action, and gave strength to resolution, yet it could not inspire courage to 
encounter the great dangers of the deep and the Avilderness, nor fill the heart 
with faith in prophecies of success. These sentiments must have been innate ; 
and those Avho braved the multitude of perils were men of true courage, and their 
faith came from the teachings of the science of their day. History and Song, 
Painting and Sculpture, have all commemorated their deeds. If Alexander the 
Great Avas thought Avorthy of having the granite body of Mount Athos hcAvn 
into a colossal image of himself,'' might not Europe and America appropriately 
join in the labor of fashioning some lofty summit of the Alleghanies^ into a huge 
monument to the memory of the Navigators avIio lifted the vail of forgetful- 
ness from the flice of the Ncav World ?* 

1 The first ships were generally of less than one hundred tons burden. Two of the vessels of 
'Columbus were without decks ; and the one in which Frobisher sailed was only twenty-five tons 
burden. 

2 Dinocrates, a celebrated architect, offered to cut Mount Athos into a statue of Alexander the 
■Great, so large, that it might hold a city in its right hand, and in its left a basin of sufficient capa- 
city to hold all the waters that poured from tlie mountain. 3 j^ote 3, page 19. 

* Page 47 There has been much discussion concerning the claims of certain navigators, to the 
honor of first discovering the Continmt of America. A " Memoir of Sebastian Cabot," illustrated by 
-documents from the Rolls, published in London in 1832, appears to prove conclusively that he, and 
VLOi his father, was the navigator who discovered North America. John Cabot was a man of science, 
and a merchant, and may have accompanied his son, in his first voyage \n 1497. Yet, in the patent 
■of Fel)ruary, 1498, in which the first voyage is referred to, are the words, "the land and isles of late 
found by the said John, in our name, and by our commandment." The first commission being issued 
in the name of John Cabot, the discoveries made by those employed by him, would of course be in 
his name. A little work, entitled "Researches respecting Americus Vespncius, and his Voyages," 
prepared by Viscount Santarem, ex-prime minister of Portugal, casts just doubts upon the statements 
■of Vespucius, concerning his command on a voyage of discovery when, he claims, he discovered 
-South America [page 41] in 1499. He was doubtless an officer under Ojeda; and it is quite cer- 
tain tliat he got possession of the narratives of Ojeda and published them as fiis own. The most 
:accessible works on American discoveries, are Irving's "Life of Columbus;" Prescott's "Ferdinand 
and Isabella;" Lives of Cabot and Hudson, in Sparks's "American Biography," and Histories of the 
United States by Graham, Banerofl and Hildrefh. 




CHAPTER 



JOHN SMITH. 



^^ There is a distinction to be observed 

in considering settlements and colonies. 
The act of forming a settlement is not 
equivalent to the establishment of a colony or the founding of a State. It is 
the initiatory step toward such an end, and may or may not exhibit permanent 
results. A colony becomes such only when settlements assume permanency, 
and organic laws, subservient to those of a parent government, are framed for 
the guidance of the people. It seems proper, therefore, to consider the era of 
settlements as distinct from that of colonial organization. 

The period of settlements within the bounds of the thirteen original coloniea 
which formed the Confederacy in the War for Independence,' extends from 1607 
to 1733. For fifty years previous to the debarkation [1607] at Jamestown," 
fishing stations had been established at various points on the Atlantic coast : 
and at St. Augustine,^ the Spaniards had kept a sort of military post alive. 
Yet the time of the appearance of the English in the James River, is the true 
point from which to date the inception or beginning of our great confederacy of 



Page 229. 



2 Page 64. 



Page 51. 



.(52 SETTLEMENTS. [IBOT. 

free States. Twelve years [1607 to 1619] were spent bj English adven- 
turers in efforts to plant a permanent settlement in Virginia/ For seventeen 
years [1609 to 1623] Dutch traders were trafficking on the Hudson River, 
before a permanent settlement was established in New York.^ Fourteen years 
[1606 to 1620] were necessary to effect a permanent settlement in Massachu- 
setts f and for nine years [1622 to 1631] adventurers struggled for a foothold 
in New Hampshire.^ The Roman Catholics were only one year [1634-5] in 
laying the foundation of the Maryland colony.' Seven years [1632 to 1639] 
were employed in effecting permanent settlements in Connecticut f eight years 
[1636 to 1643] in organizing colonial government in Rhode Island ;" and about 
fifty years [1631 to 1682] elapsed from the landing of the Swedes on South 
River," before Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania (whose several histo- 
ries of settlements are interwoven), presented colonial features.' Almost sixty 
years [1622 to 1680] passed by before the first settlements in the Carolinas 
became fully developed colonies ;'" but Georgia, the youngest of the thirteen 
States, had the foundation of its colonial government laid when Oglethorpe, 
with the first company of settlers, began to build Savannah in the winter of 
1733." The first permanent settlement within the bounds of the original 
colonies, was in 

VIRGMNIA. [1607—1619]. 

A century had not elapsed after the discoveries of Columbus [1492]," 
before a great social and political revolution had been effected in Europe. 
Commerce, hitherto confined to inland seas and along the coasts, was sending 
its ships across oceans. The art of printing had begun its wonderful work ;'' 
and, through its instrumentality, intelligence had become generally diffused. 
Mind thus acting upon mind, in vastly multiplied opportunities, had awakened 
a great moral and intellectual power, whose presence and strength had not been 
suspected. The Protestant Reformation'* had weakened the bonds of spiritual 
dominion, and allowed the moral ficulties fuller play ; and the shadows of feudal 
institutions, '^ so chilling to individual effort, were rapidly disappearmg before 

' Page 71. 2 Page 73. 3 Page 79. * Page 80. 

^ Page 82. 6 Page 89. "> Page 91. s page 92. 

9 Page 97. '" Page 99. " Page 103. '^ pg^g ^q 

13 About the year 1450. Eiide printing from engraved blocks was done before that time; but 

when Peter Schoefier cast the first metal tj'pes, each letter separately, at about 1450. the art of 

printing truly had birth. John Faust established a printing-ofBce at Mentz, in 1442. John Gutten- 

berg invented cut metal types, and' used them in printing a Bible which was commenced in 1445, 

and finished in 1460. The names of these three men are usually associated as the inventors of 

printing. 

'^ Commenced by "Wickhfie, in England, in 1360; by Huss, in Bohemia, in 1405; by Luther, 
In Germany, in 1517. From tiiis period until 1562, the movement was general throughout Europe, 
It was an eflbrt to purge the Christian Church of all impurities, by reforming its doctrine and 
ritual. The Reformers protested against some of the practices of the Roman Catholic Church, 
and the movement received the title of the Frotestant Reformation. The name of Protestants 
was first given to Luther and others in 1529. 

^^ The nature of feudal laws may be illustrated by a single example: William, the Norman 
conqueror of England, divided the land of that country into parts called baronies, and gave them 
to certain of his favorites, who became masters of the conquered people on their respective estates. 
Jor these gifts, and certain privileges, the barons, or masters, were to furnish the king with a stipu- 



1619.] VIRGINIA. 63 

the rising sun of the new era in the history of the world. Freedom of thought 
and action expanded the area of ideas, and gave birth to those tolerant princi- 
ples which lead to brotherhood of feeling. The new impulse developed nobler 
motives for human action than the acquisition of wealth and power, and these 
;BOon engendered healthj schemes for founding industrial empires in the New 
World. Aspirations for civil freedom, awakened by greater religious liberty, 
had begun the work, especially in England, where the Protestants were already 
divided into two distinct parties, called, respectively. Churchmen and Puritans. 
The former supported the throne and all monarchic ideas; the latter were 
more republican ; and from their pulpits Avent forth doctrines inimical to kingly 
power. These religious differences had begun to form a basis of political 
parties, and finally became prime elements of colonization. 

Another event, favorable to the nevf impulse, now exerted a powerful influ- 
ence. A long contest between England and France ceased in 1604. Soldiers, 
an active, restless class in England, were deprived of employment, and would 
•soon become dangerous to the public peace. While population and general 
prosperity had greatly increased, there was another large class, who, by idle- 
ness and dissipation, had squandered fortunes, and had become desperate men. 
The soldiers needed employment, either in their own art, or in equally exciting 
adventures ; and the impoverished spendthrifts were ready for any thing which 
promised gain. Such Avere the men who stood ready to brave ocean perils and 
the greater dangers of the Western World, when such minds as those of Fer- 
nando Gorges, Bartholomew Gosnold, Chief Justice Popham, Richard Hakluyt, 
Captain John Smith, and others, devised new schemes for colonization. The 
weak and timid James the First,* who desired and maintained peace with other 
nations during his reign, was glad to perceive a new field for restless and 
adventurous men to go to, and he readily granted a liberal patent [April 20, 
1606] to the first company formed after his accession to the throne, for planting 
settlements in Virginia. The English then claimed dominion over a belt of 
territory extending from Cape Fear, in North Carolina, to Halifax, in Nova 
Scotia, and indefinitely westward. This was divided into two districts. One 
extended from the vicinity of New York city northward to the present southern 
boundary of Canada, including the whole of New England, and westward of it, 
and was called North Virginia. This territory was granted to a company 
•of "knights, gentlemen, and merchants" in the west of England, called the 
Plymoyth Company?' The other district extended from the mouth of the 
Potomac southward to Cape Fear, and was called South Virginia. It was 

lated amount of money, and a stated number of men for soldiers, when required. The 'pwple had no 
voice in tliis matter, nor in any public affairs, and were made essentially slaves to the barons. Out 
of this state of things originated the exclusive privileges yet enjoyed by the nobUity of Europe. 
Except in Russia, the people have been emancipated from this vassalage, and the ancient forms of 
feudal power have disappeared. 

' He was the Sixth James of Scotland, of the house of Stuart, and son of Mary, Queen of Scot- 
land, by Lord Darnlej^ The crowns of England and Scotland were united by his accession to the 
throne of the former kingdom, in March, 1603. 

2 The chief members of the company were Thomas Hanham, Sir John and Raleigh Gilbert (sons 
of Sir Humphrey Gilbert), William Parker, George Popham, Sir John Popham (Lord Chief Justice 
of England), and Sir Fernando Gorges, Governor of Plymouth Fort. 



04 SETTLE MKXTS. [1607. 

granted to a company of " noblemen, gentlemen and merchants," chiefly resi- 
dents of London, called the London Company ^ The intermediate domain of 
almost two hundred miles, Avas a dividing line, so broad that disputes about 
territory could not occur, as neither company was allowed to make settlements 
more than fifty miles beyond its own boundary. 

The idea of popular freedom was as yet the heritage of a favored few, and 
the political character of the first colonial charter, under which a permanent 
settlement was made within the territory of the United States, was unfavorable- 
to the best interests of all. The king reserved to himself the right of appoint- 
ing all officers, and of exercising all executive and legislative power. The 
colonists were to pay homage to the sovereign, and a tribute of one fifth of the 
net products of gold and silver found in Virginia ; yet they possessed no rights 
of self-government. They Avere to be governed by a council of seven appointed 
by the king, who were allowed to choose a president from among themselves. 
There Avas also a Supreme Council in England, appointed by the king, who had 
the general supervision of the colonies, under the direction of the monarch. 
That charter Avas the conception of a narroAV mind, and despotic temper, and 
proved totally inadequate as a constitution of government for a free people. 

The North Virginia, or Plymouth Company, made the first attempt at set- 
tlement, and failed.^ The South Virginia, or London Company, sent Captain 
Christopher Newport, with three vessels and one hundred and five emigrants 
[Dec, 1606 J, to make a settlement upon Roanoke Island, ^ Avhere Raleigh's 
colony had perished alnwst tAventy years before. Among them Avas Bartholo- 
mew Gosnold, the projector of the expedition. They possessed very poor 
materials for a colony. There Avas no family among them, and only ' ' tAvelre 
laborers and a few mechanics." The remainder Averc " gentlemen,"* many of 
whom were vicious, dissolute men, totally unfit for such an enterprise, and 
quite unworthy to be actors in the glorious CA^ents anticipated by Gosnold and 
his enlightened associates at home. The voyage Avas a long and tedious one. 
Newport pursued the old route by the Canaries and the West Indies, and did 
not arrive upon the. American coast until April, 1607, AA'hen a storm drove his 
vessels into Chesapeake Bay, Avhere he found a good harbor. He named the 
capes at the entrance, Charles and Henry ^ in honor of the king's sons. A 
pleasant point of the Virginia peninsula, betAveen the York and James Rivers, 
which they next landed upon and enjoyed repose, he named Point Comfort; and 
the noble PoAvhatan River which he soon afterAvard entered he called James. 
Sailing up the broad stream about fifty miles, the immigrants landed upon a 
beautiful, shaded peninsula,' where they chose a site for the capital of the new 
empire, and called it Jamestoavn. 

1 The cliief members of the company were Sir Thomas Gates. Sir George Somers, Richard Hak- 
luyt (the historian), and Edward Maria Wingfield, who was the first governor of Virginia. 

^ Page 13. ^ Page 55. 

* Tins name was given to wealthy men, who were not engaged in any industrial pursuit, and 
often spent their lives in idleness and dissipation ; a class whicli, in our day and country, number, 
happily, very few. Labor is wortliily honored as more noble than idleness. 

s this may be called an island, for the marsh which connects it with the mainland is often over- 
flowed. The currents of the river have washed away large portions of the original island. 



1619.] VIRGINIA. Q5 

111 feelings had been engendered before they reached the Canary Islands, 
and violent disputes had arisen during the long voyage. As the silly king had 
placed the names of the colonial council in a sealed box, with instructions not 
to open it until their arrival in Virginia, there was no competent authority on 
board to restore harmony. Captain Smith,' who was the most able man among 
them, excited the envy of his companions ; and being charged with a design to 
murder the council, usurp government, and proclaim himself king, he was 
placed in confinement. On opening the sealed box, it was discovered that 
Smith was one of the council. He was released from confinement; but, 
through the influence of Wingfield, an avaricious, unprincipled, but talented 
man, he was excluded from office. Smith demanded a trial upon the absurd 
charges. The accusation was Avithdrawn, and he took his seat in the council, 
over which Wingfield was chosen to preside. 

Soon after landing, Newport, Smith, and twenty others, ascended the 
James River to the Falls at Richmond, and visited the emperor of the Powhat- 
ans,* whose residence was a mile below the foot of the rapids. The title of the 
emperor Avas Powhatan, which signified supreme ruler, as did Pharaoh in the 
ancient Egyptian language— the chief man in Egypt. He was a man of great 
ability, and commanded the reverence of the whole confederation. He appeared 
friendly to the English, notwithstanding his people murmured at their presence ; 
and the visitors returned to Jamestown much gratified. 

Early in June, 1607, Newport sailed for England, to obtain more settlers 
and provisions. The little band of emigrants soon perceived the perils of their 
situation. A large portion of their provisions had been spoiled during the 
voyage. They had not planted, therefore they could not reap. The neighboring 
tribes evinced hostility, and withheld supplies. Poisonous vapor arose from 
the marshes ; and before the close of summer, one half of the adventurers per- 
ished by disease and famine. Among the victims was Gosnold. The settlers, 
in their despair, reproached themselves and the leaders of the expedition, and 
longed to depart for the Old "World. In the midst of their despondency, the 
survivors discovered that president Wingfield was living on choice stores, and 
was preparing to abandon the colony and escape to the West Indies in the pin- 
nace^ left by Newport. Their indignation was thoroughly aroused, and he was 
deposed. Ratchffe, a man as weak and wicked as Wingfield, was chosen his 
successor. He, too, was speedily dismissed ; and the settlers, with one con- 
sent, wisely turned to Smith as ruler. 

It was a happy hour for the Virginia settlers when Captain Smith took the 
reins of government. All was confusion ; but he soon restored order ; and by 
his courage and energy, inspired the Indians with awe, and compelled them to 
bring him supplies of food. In October, wild game became plentiful ; and at 
the beginning of November, the abundant harvest of Indian corn was gathered 

' See portrait at the head of this Chapter. Smith was one of the most remarkable men of hia 
time. He was bom in Lincolnshire, England ; and after many adventures in Europe, went to 
America. He died in 1631. He wrote a History of Virginia, and several other works 

' Page 20. ' = A small, light vessel, with sails and oara. 

5 



66 SETTLEMENTS. [l607. 

by tlie natives, and they supplied the settlers with all they needed. Having 
estabhshed a degree of comfort and prosperity, Smith started, with some com- 
panions, to explore the surrounding country. He ascended the Chickahomminj 
River fifty miles from its mouth, and then, with two companions, penetrated 
the vast forest that covered the land. His companions were slain by the na- 
tives, and he was made a captive. After being exhibited in several villages, he 
was taken to Opechancanough, Uhe eldest brother of Powhatan, who, regarding 
Smith as a superior being, spared his life, and conducted him to the emperor, 
then at Weroworomoco, on the York River.* A solemn council decided that 
the captive must die, and Smith was prepared for execution. His head was 
placed upon a stone, and the heavy clubs of the executioners were raised to 
crush it, when Pocahontas, a child v of "ten or twelve years,"' the favorite 



/\\ 




POCAHONTAS. 

daughter of Powhatan, rushed from her father's side, and casting herself upon 
the captive, besought the king to spare his life. PoAvhatan consented, and 
Smith was conducted in safety to Jamestown by a guard of twelve men, after 
an absence of seven weeks. 

God, in his providence, overrules every thing for good. It is seen in this 
event, for Smith's captivity was a public benefit. He had acquired a knowl- 
edge of the Indian character, and of the country and its resources, and also had 
formed friendly relations with the sachems and chiefs. Had his companions 

' Note 5, page 106. 

2 At Shelly, nearly opposite the mouth of Queen's Creek, Gloucester County, Virginia. 

3 Page 70. 



II 



1619.] VIRGINIA. 67 

possessed half as much energy and honesty as Smith, all would have been well. 
Eut they were idle, improvident, and dissolute. As usual, he found every 
thing in disorder on his return from the forest. Only forty men were living, 
and a greater portion of them Averc on the point of escaping to the West Indies 
in the pinnace ; but the courage and energy of Smith compelled them to re- 
main. Conscious of the purity of their ruler and the wickedness of themselves, 
they hated him intensely, and from that time they plotted for his destruction, 
or the overthrow of his poAver. 

Captain Newport arrived with supplies and one hundred and twenty im- 
migrants, early in 1608. These were no better than the first adventurers. 
Instead of agriculturalists and mechanics, with families, they were idle "gentle- 
men," "packed hither," as Smith said, "by their friends, to escape ill destin- 
ies." There were also several unskillful goldsmiths, the very men least needed 
dn the colony. Some glittering earth in the vicinity of Jamestown, was by them 
mistaken for gold ; and in spite of the remonstrances of Smith, the whole indus- 
try of the colony was directed to the supposed treasure. " There was no talk, 
no hope, no work, but dig gold, work gold, refine gold, load gold." Newport 
loaded his vessel with the worthless earth, and returned to England, believing 
himself exceedingly rich ; but science soon pronounced him miserably poor in 
useful knowledge and well-earned reputation. 

The gold-fever had taken strong hold upon the indolent dreamers, and 
Smith remonstrated against idleness and pleaded for industry, in vain. He 
implored the settlers to plow and sow, that they might reap and be happy. 
They refused to listen, and he turned from Jamestown with disgust. With a 
few sensible men, he went to explore the Chesapeake in an open boat, and 
every bay, inlet, and creek, received his attention. He went up the Potomac 
to the falls above Washington city ; and then, after exploring the shores of the 
Rappahannock to the site of Fredericsburg, he returned to Jamestown. A 
few days afterward he returned again to the Chesapeake, carefully explored 
each shore above the mouth of the Potomac, and entered the Patapsco, and ate 
Indian corn on the site of Baltimore. He also went up the Susquchannah to 
the beautiful vale of Wyoming,' and penetrated the forests even to the territory 
of the Five Nations,^ and established friendly relations with the dusky tribes. 
Within three months he traveled full three thousand miles. It was one of the 
most wonderful of exploring expeditions, considered in all its aspects, ever re- 
corded by the pen of history ; and the map of the country, which Smith con- 
structed on his return, is yet in existence in England, and is remarkable for its 
general accuracy. 

Captain Smith returned to Jamestown on the 7th of September, 1608, and 
three days afterward he was formally made president of the settlement. New- 
port arrived soon afterward, with seventy immigrants, among whom were two 
females, the first English women ever seen upon the James River. ^ To the 
soil they were compelled to look, chiefly, for their food, and Smith exerted all 

Page 290 ^ Page 23. » Page 105. 



68 SETTLEMENTS. [IGOT. 

his energies to turn the little industry of the settlers to agriculture. He suc- 
ceeded, in a degree, but he had poor materials out of Avhich to form a healthy, 
self-sustaining commonwealth. He wrote to the Supreme Council' to send over 
a diiferent class of men. ''I entreat you," he said, "rather send but thirty 
carpenters, husbandmen, gardeners, fishermen, blacksmiths, masons, and diggers 
of trees' roots, well provided, than a thousand such as we have." Yet, with all 
his exertions, idleness and improvidence prevailed. At the end of two years 
from the first landing at Jamestown, and when the settlement numbered twO' 
hundred strong men, not more than forty acres were under cultivation. To the 
Indians the wdiite people were compelled to look for their chief supply of food. 

The London Company were disappointed, for the anticipations of sudden 
wealth, in which they had indulged, v;ere not realized, and they sought and ob- 
tained a new charter [June 2, 1609], which gave them more ample privileges. 
The territory of South Virginia^ was extended northward to the head of the 
Chesapeake. The Supreme Council was vested with power to fill vacancies in 
its own body, and to appoint a governor for Virginia, whose rule was made ab- 
solute. The lives, liberties, and property of the settlers were at his disposal, 
and they were compelled to contribute a certain share of their earnings to the 
proprietors. Thus they were mere vassals at will, under a petty despotism, 
without any inherent power, then recognized, to cast off the yoke. 

Under that charter. Lord De la Warr (Delaware), an enlightened peer, 
was appointed governor of Virginia, for life, and soon afterward Newport sailed 
for America [June 12, 1609], with nine ships, and more than five hundred 
emigrants.' Sir Thomas Gates, the governor's deputy, embarked with New^- 
port, accompanied by Sir George Somers. Gates, Newport, and Somers, 
were commissioned to administer the government until the arrival of Delaware. 
When near the coast, a hurricane dispersed the fleet, and the vessel bearing the 
commissioners was wrecked on one of the Bermuda Islands. Seven vessels of 
the squadron reached the James River in safety. The colony would have been 
the gainer had these never arrived, for a greater portion of the new immigrants 
were more profligate, if possible, than the first. They were dissolute scions of 
wealthy families, and many of them came to avoid punishment for crimes at 
home. They regarded Virginia as a paradise for libertines, and believed the 
colony to be without a head until the arrival of the governor or his deputy. 
Smith, on the contrary, boldly asserted his authority as president, and main- 
tained it until an accident in autumn compelled him to go to England for sur- 
gical aid/ when he delegated his authority to George Percy, brother of the 
duke of Northumberland. 

When the idle and profligate settlers were released from the control of 

' Page 64. " Page 63. 

^ Domestic animals were now first taken to Virginia. They consisted of six mares, one horse, 
six hundred swine, a few sheep and goats, and five hundred domestic fowls. Two years later one 
hundred cows and some other cattle were brought over, 

* While passing dowm the James River, in a boat, from the Falls, Smith's bag of powder ignited, 
and the explosion almost kiUed hun. His wounds were so severe as to require the most skillful 
surgery. 



1619.] , VIRGINIA. 69 

Smith, they gave themselves up to every irregularity of life. Their ample 
stock of provisions was rapidly consumed. The Indians had great respect for 
Smith, and >yere friendly while he remained, but after his departure, they 
openly showed their contempt for the English, withheld supplies of provisions, 
and conceived a plan for the total extermination of the white intruders. Fam- 
ine ensued, and the winter and spring of 1610 were long remembered as "the 
starving time." Those who went to the cabins of the Indians, for food, were 
treacherously murdered ; and finally a plan was matured by the natives for 
striking a blow of utter extermination. Again Pocahontas performed the part 
of a guardian angel.* On a dark and stormy night she hastened to Jamestown, 
revealed the plot, and was back to her couch before the dawn. Thus, she saved 
the colonists by placing them on their guard. Yet death hovered over them. 
The horrors of destitution increased, and the settlement which numbered five 
hundred persons when Smith left, was reduced to sixty within six months after 
his departure. The commissioners'' finally arrived. They constructed a rude 
vessel upon the barren island where they were wrecked, and in it reached 
Virginia, in June, 1610. Instead of being greeted by a flourishing people, 
they were met by a mere remnant, almost famished. There appeared no way 
to obtain food, and Gates determined to sail immediately for Newfoundland,* 
and distribute the immigrants among the English fishing vessels there. James- 
town was utterly abandoned, and toward Hampton Roads* the dejected settlers 
sailed in four pinnaces. Early the next morning white sails greeted their 
vision. Lord Delaware had arrived with provisions and immigrants ; and that 
very night, Jamestown, abandoned to pagans in the morning, was made vocal 
with hymns of thanksgiving to the true God, by the returned settlers. 

Governor Delaware was a virtuous and prudent man, and under his admin- 
istration the colony began to prosper. Failing health compelled him to return 
to England the following spring [March, 1611J ; and he left the government 
in the hands of Percy, Smith's successor, who managed with prudence until the 
arrival of Sir Thomas Dale, with supplies.* Dale was an experienced soldier, 
and, assuming the government, he ruled by martial law. Early in September 
following, Sir Thomas Gates arrived with six well-furnished ships, and three 
hundred immigrants. With this arrival came hope for the colony. A large 
portion of the new settlers were sober, industrious men, and their arrival gave 
great joy to the four hundred colonists at Jamestown. Gates assumed the 
functions of governor, and Dale went up the river to plant new settlements at 
the mouth of the Appomattox and near the Falls. ^ And now a wise change in 
the domestic policy of the colony Avas made. Hitherto the land had been 
worked in common, and the product of labor was deposited in public storehouses, 
for the good of the community. The industrious created food for the indolent, 
•ind an incentive to eflfort was wanting. That incentive was necessary ; and it 
was found in the plan of making an assignment of a few acres of land to each 

' Pa^e 66. ' ^ Page 68. ^ Page 47. * Note 3, page 297. 

^ Delaware afterward sailed for Virginia, to resume the reins of government, but died on the 
Toyage. " Near the present City Point, and Pviehmoud. 



70 SETTLEMENTS. [IGOT 

man, to be cultivated for his own private benefit. This regulation gave a pow- 
erful impulse to industry. Larger assignments were made, and soon the com- 
munitj system was abandoned, and industry on private account created an 
ample supply of food for all.' 

! A third charter was obtained by the London Company, on the 22d 
of March, 1612, by which the control of the king was annulled. The 
Supreme Council was abolished, and the whole company, sitting as a demo- 
cratic assembly, elected the officers, and ordained the laws, for the colony. 
Yet no political privilege was granted to the settlers. Their very exist- 
ence as a body politic, was completely ignored. They had no voice in the 
choice of rulers and the enactment of laws. Yet they were contented ; and at 
the beginning of 1613 there were a thousand Englishmen in Virginia. At 
about this time an event occurred, which proved of permanent benefit to the 
settlement. Powhatan had continued to manifest hostile feelings ever since the 
departure of Smith. For the purpose of extorting advantageous terms of peace 
from the Indian king, Captain Argall (a sort of buccaneer),'-^ bribed an Indian, 
chief, yfiih a copper kettle, to betray the trusting Pocahontas into his hands. 
She was induced to go on board his vessel, where she was detained as a prisoner 
for several months, until Powhatan ransomed her. In the mean while, a mutual 
attachment had grown up between the maiden and John Rolfe, a young En- 
glishman of good family. He had instructed her in letters and religion ; and,, 
with the consent of Powhatan, she received the rite of Christian baptism, and 
became the wife of Rolfe, in April, 1613. This union brought peace, and 
Powhatan was ever afterward the friend of the English. 

Prosperity now smiled upon the settlement, yet the elements of a perma- 
nent State were wanting. There were no families in Virginia, and all the 
settlers indulged in anticipations of returning to England, which they regarded 
as home. Gates went thither in March, 1614, leaving the administration of 
government with Sir Thomas Dale, who ruled with wisdom and energy for 
about two years, and then departed, after appointing George Yeardley deputy- 
governor. During Yeardley' s administration, the culture of the tobacco plant' 
was promoted, and so rapidly did it gain in favor, that it soon became, not onljr 
the principal article of export, but the currency of the colony. And now 
[1617J Argall, the buccaneer, was appointed deputy-governor. He was a des- 
pot in feelings and practice, and soon disgusted the people. He was succeeded 
by Yeardley, who was appointed governor in 1619 ; and then dawned the natal 
morning of Virginia as a Republican State. Yeardley abolished martial law, 

* A similar result was seen in the operations of the Plymouth colony. See page 116. 
" Note 7, page 58. • 

^ This plant, yet very extensively cultivated in Virginia and the adjoinuig States, was first 
discovered by Sir Francis Drake, near Tabaco, in Yucatan : hence its name. Drake and Raleigh 
first introduced it into England. Kmg James conceived a great hatred 'of it, and wrote a treatise 
against its use. He forbade its cultivation in England, but could not prevent its importation from 
Virginia. It became a very profitable article of commerce, and the streets of Jamestown were 
planted with it. Other agricultural productions were neglected, and while cargoes of tobacco were 
preparing for England, the necessaries of life were wanting. The money value of tobacco was about 
*xty-six cents a pound. 



1619.] NEW YORK. 71 

released the planters from feudal service to the colony/ and established repre- 
sentative government/ The settlement was divided into eleven boroughs, and 
two representatives, called burgesses, were chosen by the people for each. 
These, with the governor and council, constituted the colonial government. 
The burgesses were allowed to debate all matters pertaining to the good of the 
colony ; but their enactments were not legal until sanctioned by the company 
in England. The most important event of that year occurred on the 28th of 
June. On that day, the first representative assembly ever convened in Amer- 
ica, met at Jamestown. Then and thei-e, the foundations of the Virginia 
commonwealth were laid. The people now began to regard Virginia as their 
home, and "fell to building houses and planting corn." Within two years 
afterward, one hundred and fifty reputable young women were sent over to 
become wives to the planters.' the tribe of gold-seekers and "gentlemen" was 
extinct, for " it was not the will of God that the new State should be formed 
of such material ; that such men should be the fathers of a progeny born on the 
American soil, who were one day to assert American liberty by their eloquence, 
and defend it by their valor." * 



CHAPTER II. 

NEW YORK [1G09 — 1G23]. 

In a preceding chapter,^ we have considered the discovery and exploration 
of the river, bearing his name, by Henry Hudson, then in the service of the 
Dutch East India Company. On his return to England [Nov. 1G09], he for- 
warded to his employers in Amsterdam,® a brilliant account of his discoveries in 
America. Jealous of the maritime enterprise and growing power of the Dutch, 
the British king would not allow Hudson to go to Holland, fearing he might be 
employed in making further discoveries, or in planting settlements in America. 
This narrow and selfish policy of James was of no avail, for the ocean pathway 
to new and fertile regions, once opened, could easily be traversed by inferior 
navigators. This fact Avas soon demonstrated. In 1610, some wealthy mer- 
chants of Amsterdam, directors of the Dutch East India Company,'^ sent a ship 
from the Texel, laden with merchandise, to traffic with the Indians upon the 
Mauritius,* as the present Hudson River was then called. Hudson's ship (the 
Half-Moon'^^ was also sent hither the same year on a like errand ; and for three 

\ Page 68. 

* Yeardley found the people possessed with an intense desire for that freedom which the 
Enghsh constitution gave to every subject of tlie realm, and it was impossible to reconcile that feel- 
ing with the exercise of the arbitrary power which had hitherto prevailed. He, therefore, formed 
a plan for a popular assembly as similar to the English parliament as circumstances would allow. 

3 Page 105. * Bancroft. 5 Page 59. 6 Page 59. 

' Note 5, page 59. s go named, in honor of Prince Maurice, of Nassau. ' Page 59. 



"72 SETTLEMENTS. [160a 

years afterward, private enterprise dispatched many vessels from Holland, to 
trafific for furs and peltries. Among other commanders came the bold Adrian 
Block, the first navigator of the dangerous strait in the East River, called 
Hell-Gate. Block's vessel was accidentally burned in the autumn of 1613, 
when he and his companions erected some rude huts for shelter, near the site 
of the Bowling Green, at the foot of Broadway, New York. These huts formed 
the gerni of our great commercial metropolis. During the ensuing winter 
they constructed a vessel from the fine timber which grew upon Manhattan 
Island, and early in the spring they sailed up Long Island Sound on a voyage 
of discovery which extended to Nahant. Block first discovered the Connecticut 
and Thames Rivers, and penetrated Narraganset Bay to the site of Provi- 
dence. ^ 

Intent upon gain, Dutch trading vessels now frequently ascended the Mau- 
ritius, and a brisk trade in furs and peltries was opened with the Indian tribes, 
almost two hundred miles from the ocean. The traders built a fort and store- 
house upon a little island just below Albany, in 1614, which they called Fort 
Nassau; and nine years later. Fort Orange was erected near the river, a little 
south of the foot of the present State-street, in Albany, on the site of Albany. 
There is a doubt about a fort being erected on the southern extremity of Man- 
hattan Island, at this time, as some chroniclers have asserted. It is probable 
the trading-house erected there was palisaded, as a precautionary measure, for 
they could not well determine the disposition of the Indians. 

On the 11th of October, 1614, a special charter was granted to a company 
of Amsterdam merchants, giving them the monopoly of trade in the New 
World, from the latitude of Cape ]\Iay to that of Nova Scotia, for three years. 
The territory was named Neav Netherland, in the charter, which title it held 
until it became an English province in 1664.' Notwithstanding it was included 
in the grant of James to the Plymouth company,* no territorial jurisdiction 
being claimed, and no English settlements having been made northward of 
Richmond, in Virginia, the Dutch were not disturbed in their traffic. The 
popular story, that Argall entered the Bay of New York on his return from 
Acadie in 1613, and made the Dutch traders promptly surrender the place to 
the English crown, seems unsusceptible of proof 

Success attended the Dutch from the beginning. The trade in furs and 
peltries became very lucrative, and the company made an unsuccessful applica- 
tion for a renewal of their charter. ]\Iore extensive operations were in contem- 
plation; and on the 3d of June, 1621, the States General of Holland^ 
incorporated the DiUch West India Company, and invested it with almost 
regal powers, for planting settlements in America from Cape Horn to New- 
foundland ; and in Africa, between the Cape of Good Hope and the Tropic of 
Cancer. The special object of its enterprise was New Netherland, and espe- 
cially the region of the Mauritius.^ The company was not completely organized 

' Page 144. 2 Page 63. 

3 See Brodhead's " History of the State of New York," Appendix E, where the matter is dis- 
cussed at some length. 4 Note 7, page 59. ^ Page 71. 






1620.] MASSACHUSETTS. 73 

until the spring of 1623, Avhen it commenced operations with vigor. Its first 
efforts were to plant a permanent colony, and thus establish a plausible pretext 
for territorial jurisdiction, for now the English had built rude cabins on the 
shores of Massachusetts Bay.' In April, 1623, thirty families, chiefly Wal- 
loons (French Protestants who had fled to Holland), arrived at Manhattan, 
under the charge of Cornelius Jacobsen May, who was sent to reside in New 
Netherland, as first director, or governor. Eight of the fam- 
ilies went up the Mauritius or Hudson River, and settled at 
Albany ; the remainder chose their place of abode across the 
channel of the East River, and settled upon lands now cov- 
ered by the eastern portions of Brooklyn, and the Navy 
Yard.'' Then were planted the fruitful seeds of a Dutch 
colony — then were laid the foundations of the future com- 
monwealth of New York.' The territory was erected into ^^^"^ eeland.''''™" 
a province and the armorial distinction of a coimi was 
granted.* 




CHAPTER III. 

MASSACHUSETTS [1G06— 1G20]. 

Soon after obtaining their charter, in 1606, the Plymouth Company* 
dispatched an agent in a small vessel, with two captive Indians, to examine 
North Virginia. This vessel was captured by a Spanish cruiser. Another ves- 
sel, fitted out at the sole expense of Sir John Popham, and commanded by 
Martin Pring, was sent, and reached America. Pring confirmed the accounts 
of Gosnold and others," concerning the beauty and fertility of the New Eno-land 
region. The following year [1607], George Popham' came, with one hundred 
immigrants, and landing at the mouth of the Sagadahoc or Kennebec [August 
21], they erected there a small stockade, a storehouse, and a few huts. All 
but forty-five returned to England in the vessels ; those remained, and named 
their settlement St. George. A terrible winter ensued. Fire consumed their 
store-house and some of their provisions, and the keen frosts and deep snows 

> Page 18. 

^ The first white child born in New Netherland was Sarah Rapelje, daughter of one of the 
"Walloon settlers. Her birth occurred on the 7th of June, 1625. She has a number of descendants 
on Long Island. 3 Page 144. 

4 Several hundred years ago, there were large districts of country in England, and on the con- 
tinent, governed by Earls, who were subject to the crown, however. These districts were called 
counties, and the name is still retained, even in the United States, and indicates certain judicial and 
other jurisdiction. New Netherland was constituted a county of Holland, having all the individual 
privileges appertaining to an earldom, or separate government. The armorial distinction of an carl, 
VT count, was a kind of cap, called coronet, seen over the shield in the above engraved repre- 
sentation of the seal of New Netherland. The figure of a beaver, on the shield, is emblematic of 
the Hudson River regions (where that animal then abounded), and of one of the grand objects of 
settlement there, the trade in furs. * Page 03. ^ Page 58. 7 Note 2, page 03. 



74 SETTLEMENTS. [1606. 

locked the waters and the forests against the fisherman and hunter. Famine 
menaced them, but relief came before any were made victims. Of all the com- 
pany, only Popham, their president, died. Lacking courage to brave the perils 
of the wilderness, the settlement was abandoned, and the immigrants went back 
to England [1608] at the very time when the Frenchmen, who Avere to build 
Quebec,' Avere upon the ocean. Traffic with the Indian tribes was continued, 
but settlements were not again attempted for several years.^ 

Only the coast of the extensive country was seen by the several navigators 
who visited it. The vast interior, now called New England, was an unknown 
land, until Captain John Smith, Avith the mind of a philosopher and the courage 
of a hero, came, in 1614, and explored, not only the shores but the rivers 
which penetrated the wilderness. Only himself and four London merchants 
had an interest in the expedition, Avhich proved highly successful, not only in 
discoveries, but in trade. With only eight men, Smith examined the region 
between Cape Cod and the Penobscot, constructed a map of the country, and 
after an absence of less than seven months, he returned to England, and laid a 
report before Prince Charles (afterAvard the unfortunate king who lost his head), 
the heir apparent to the throne. The prince, delighted A\uth the whole account, 
confirmed the title A\'hich Smith had given to the territory delineated on the 
map, and it was named Neav England. Crime, as usual, dimmed the luster 
of the discovery. Hunt, commander of one of the vessels of the expedition, 
kidnapped twenty-scA^en of the Indians, Avith Squanto,^ their chief, as soon as 
Smith had departed, took them to Spain and sold some of them into slavery.' 
And noAV, at various points from Florida to NcAvfoundland. men -stealers of dif- 
ferent nations, had planted the seeds of hatred and distrust,'^ Avhose fruits, in 
after years Avere wars, and complicated troubles. 

At the close of 1614, the Plymouth company employed Smith to make 
further explorations in America and to plant a colony. Lie sailed in the spring 
of 1615, but Avas driven back by a tempest. He sailed again on the 4th of 
July following. His creAV became mutinous, and finally his vessel was cap- 
tured by a French pirate, and they were all taken to France. Smith escaped 
to England, in an open boat, and arousing the sluggish energies of the Ply- 
mouth company and others, they planned vast schemes of colonization, and he 
was made admiral for life. Eager for gains, some of the members, joining 
with others, applied for a ncAV charter. It AA^as Avithheld for a long time. 
Finally, the king granted a charter [NoA^ember 3, 1620] to forty of the wealth- 
iest and most powerful men in the realm, AAdio assumed the corporate title of The 
Council of Plymouth, and superseded the original Plymouth Company.' 
The vast domain of more than a million of square miles, lying between the fortieth 
and forty-eighth degree of north latitude, and westward to the South Sea,'' 

' Page 49. 

"^ The celebrated Lord Bacon, and others, fitted out an expedition to Newfoundland in 1610, 
but it was unsuccessful. ^ Page 114. 

* AA^'hen some benevolent friars heard of Hunt's intentions, they took all of the Indians not yet 
sold, to instruct tliera as missionaries. Among them was Squanto. 

■* See pages 42 and 49. '^ Page 63. 7 Page 42. 



1620.] MASSACHUSETTS. 75 

was conveyed to them, as absolute owners of the soil. It was the finest portion 
of the Continent, and now embraces the most flourishing States and Territories 
of our confederacy. This vast monopoly Avas unpropitious, in all its elements, 
to the founding of an empire. It was not the will of God that mere speculators 
and mercenary adventurers like these should people this broad land. The same 
year when that great commercial monopoly was formed [1620], a company of 
devout men and Momen in Holland, who had been driven from England by a. 
persecuting government, came to the wilderness of the New "World, not to seek 
gold and return, but to erect a tabernacle, where they might worship the Great 
God in honest simplicity and freedom, and to plant in the wilderness the found- 
ation of a commonwealth, based upon truth anoi justice. Who were they? 
Let History answer. 

Because the pope of Rome would not sanction an important measure 
desired by a greater part of the people, King Henry the Eighth of England 
defied tlie authority of the head of the Church, and, by the Act of Supreniaci/,^ 
Parliament also cast oti'the papal yoke. Yet religious freedom for the people 
was not a consequence, for the king was vii-tually pope of Great Britair. 
Heresy was a high crime ; and expressions of freedom of thought and opinion 
were not tolerated. The doctrines and rituals of the Romish church were 
enforced, while the mithority of the pope was denied. The people discovered 
that in exchanging spiritual masters, they had gained nothing, except that the 
thunders of excommunication^ had lost their effect upon the public mind, and 
thus one step toward emancipation was gained. Henry's son, EdA^^a-rd, est-ib- 
lished a more liberal Protestantism in England [1547], and 
soon the followers of Luther and Calvin* drew the tangible 
line of doctrinal difference which existed between them. The 
former retained or alloAved many of the ceremonials of the 
church of Rome ; the latter were more austere, and demanded 
extreme simplicity in worship, and great purity of life. For 
this they were called Puritans, in derision ; a name which 
soon became honorable. WTien Parliament established a 
liturgy for the church, the Puritans refused conformity, for 
they acknowledged no authority but the Bible in matters of 
religion. They became a distmct and influential party in 
the State [1550], and were specially commended by the con- 
tmental reformers. 




^ The people, whose proclivities were toward Protestantism, deprecated the influence of the 
queen (Catharine of Arragon), who was a zealous Roman Catholic, and desired her divorce from 
tlie monarch. The king was very willing, for he wished to marry the beautiful Anne Boleyn. 
Pope Julius the Third refused to sanction a divorce, when the king, on whom had been conferred 
the title of " Defender of the Faith." quarreled with the pontiff, and professed Protestantism. 

* An Act of Parliament, adopted in 1534, which declared the king of England the superior head 
of the Church in that realm, and made Protestantism the estabhshed religion of England. 

^ The Pope of Rome assumes the right to excommunicate, or expel from Christian communion, 
whomsoever he pleases. In former times, even kings were not exempt. An excommunicated 
person lost social caste ; and for centuries this was an iron rod in the hand of ecclesiastics to keep 
the people in submission to spiritual authority. Happily for mankind, this species of despotism has 
lost its power, and commands the obedience of only the ignorant and enslaved. 

* See note 14, page 62. Calvin was the leading French Reformer. 



76 SETTLEMENTS. [1606. 

Romanism was re-established in England in 1553, by Mary, the daughter 
and successor of Henry the Eighth, who was a bigoted persecutor of Protestants 
of every name. Lutherans and Calvinists w^ere equally in peril. The fires of 
persecution were lighted, and the first Protestant martyrs were consumed at the 
Stake. ^ Her reign was short, and she is known in history as the bloody Mary. 
She was succeeded by her half-sister, Elizabeth, in 1558, who was a professed 
Protestant, and the flames were extinguished. Elizabeth was no Puritan, 
She endeavored to reconcile the magnificent rituals of the Romish Church with 
the simple requisitions of the gospel. There was no affinity, and trouble 
ensued. The Puritans, struggling for power, asserted, in all its grandeur, the 
doctrine of private judgment ni i-eligious matters, and of untrammeled religious 
liberty. From this high position, it was but a step to the broad rock of civil 
freedom. The Puritan pulpits became the tribunes of the common people, and 
the preachers often promulgated the doctrine, that the sovereign was amenable 
to public ojniiion iv hen fair ly expressed. This was the very essence of demo- 
cratic doctrine, and evinced a boldness hitherto unparalleled. The jealousy 
and the fears of the queen were aroused ; and after several years of effort, the 
Thirty-nine Articles of belief, which constitute the rule of faith in the Church 
of England, were confirmed [1571] by an Act of Parliament. 

And now bigotry in power began its wicked work. In 1583, a court of 
high commission was established, for the detection and punishment of Non- 
Conformists,* with powers almost as absolute as the Roman Inquisition. Per- 
secution began its work in earnest, and continued active for twenty years. The 
Puritans looked to the accession of James of Scotland, nvhich took place in 
1604,' with hope, but were disappointed. He was the most contemptible mon- 
arch that ever disgraced the chair of supreme government in England. A 
brilliant English writer* says, "He was cunning, covetous, waisteful, idle, 
drunken, greedy, dirty, cowardly, a great swearer, and the most conceited man 
on earth." The pure in heart could expect no consideration from such a man. 
When he was fairly seated on the English throne, he said of the Puritans, "I 
will make them conform or I will harrie them out of the land." There were 
then more than thirty thousand of them in England. During the first year of 
James's reign, three hundred of their ministers Avere silenced, imprisoned, or 
exiled. The long struggle of the established church Avith the Roman Catholics 
on one hand, and the Puritans on the other, was now decided. It had been a 
struggle of three quarters of a century, not so much for toleration as for 
supremacy ; and the Church of England was the final victor. During these 
trials, England lost some of her best men. Among the devout ones who fled 



^ John Rogers, a pious minister, and John Hooper, Bishop of Gloucester, were the first who 
suffered. 

^ This was the title of all those Protestants in England who refused to conform to the doctrines 
and ceremonials of the Established Church. This name was first given in 1572. Ninety years 
afterward [1662], 2,000 ministers of the Established Church, unwilling to subscribe to the Thirty- 
nine Articles, seceded, and were called Dissenters ; a name yet applied to all British Protestants 
who are not attached to the Church of England. 

3 See note 1, page 63. * Charles Dickens. 



1620.] MASSACHUSETTS. 77 

from persecution, was the Reverend John Robinson, pastor of a flock gathered 
in the northern counties. Informed that there -was " freedom of religion for all 
men in Holland,'' he fled thither, -with his people, in 1608, and established a 
church at Ley den. Thej were soon joined by others from their native country. 
Their purity of life and lofty independence commanded the admiration of the 
Dutch ; and their loyalty to the country from which they had been driven, was 
respected as a noble virtue. There they learned many of those sound political 
maxims which lie at the foundation of our own government ; for there those 
principles of civil liberty, which lay almost dormant in theory, in England, 
were found in daily practice. 

At Leyden, the English exiles were charmed by the narratives of the Dutch 
voyagers to America. They felt that they had now no home, no abiding place 
— that they were only Pilgrims — and they resolved to go to the New World, 
fir away from persecutions, where they might establish a colony, with religious 
freedom for its basis. A deputation went to England in 1617,' and through the 
influence of powerful friends," obtained the consent of the Plymouth Company 
to settle in North Virginia,^ and also a promise from the king that ho would 
wink at their heresy, and let them alone in their new home. They asked no 
more. Some London merchants formed a partnership with them, and furnished 
capital for the expedition.^ Captain John Smith, 
the founder of Virginia and explorer of New En- 
gland, ofiered his services, but on account of his 
aristocratic notions, they were declined. Two 
ships {Speedivell and May-Flowe?') were pur- 
chased and furnished,^ and in the summer of 1620, 
a portion of the Pilgrims in Holland — "the 
youngest and strongest" — embarked from Delft- 
Haven for England.® Robinson and the larger 
portion of his flock remained at Leyden till a more m\y-flower 

convenient season,^ and elder Brewster accompanied 

the voyagers as their spiritual guide. The two ships left Southampton, 
in England, on the 5th of August, 1620. The courage of the captain and 
company of the Speedwell failed, and the vessels put back to port. The sails 
of the May-Flower were again spread, in the harbor of Plymouth, on the 6th 



' John Carver and Robert Cushman. 

' Sir Edward Sandys [page 105] was one of their cliief advocates in England. ' Page Ci. 

* The services of each emigrant were valued as a capital of ten pounds, and belonged to the 
tompany. All profits were to be reserved tUl the end of seven years, when all the lands, houses, 
and every production of their joint industry, were to be valued, and the amount divided among the 
shareholders, according to their respective interests. This was a community of interest, similar, in 
character, to those which have been proposed and attempted in our day, under the respective titles 
of Communism, Fourierism, and Socialism. It failed to accomphsh its intended purpose, and was 
abandoned. 

' The Speedwell was a vessel of 60 tons; the May-Flowe?- of 180 tons. 

' See engraving on page 104. This is a copy of a picture of Tlie Embarkation of the Pilgrims^ 
in the Rotunda of tlie National Capitol, painted by Professor Robert W. "Weir, of the Military 
Academy, at West Point, New York. 

' Mr. Robinson was never permitted to see America Notes 3, and 5, page 116, 




78 SETTLEMENTS. [1606. 

of September, pjkI forty-one men, most of them with families' (one hundred and 
one in all) — the winnowed remnant of the Pilgrims who left Delft-Haven — 
crossed the stormy Atlantic. These were they who came to the New World to 
'enjoy liberty of conscience and freedom of action, and to lay, broad and deep, a 
portion of the foundations of our happy Republic. After a boisterous passage 
of sixty-three days, thee May-Flower anchored Avithin Cape Cod.^ Before 
proceeding to the shore, the Pilgrims agreed upon a form of government, and 
committed it to writing.^ To that^rs^ constitution of (jovernment ever sub- 
scribed by a whole people, the forty-one men affixed their names, and then 
elected John Carver to be their governor.* In the cabin of the May-Floioer 
the first republican government in America was solemnly inaugurated. That 
vessel thus became truly the cradle of liberty in America, rocked on the free 
waves of the ocean. 

The May-Plovier was tossed about on the ocean for two long months, and 
the approach to land was a joyful event for the settlers. Exploring parties 
were sent out,^ and after many hardships, they selected a place for landing. It 
was on the 22d day of December, 1620, that the Pilgrim Fathers first set 
foot upon a bare rock on the bleak coast of Massachusetts Bay, while all 
around, the earth was covered with deep snow.* They called the landing-place 



' The following are their names: John Carver, "William Bradford, Edward Winslow, WiUiam 
Brew.ster, Isaac AHerton, Captain Miles Standish, John Aldeu, Samuel Fuller, Christopher Martin, 
William Mulhns, William White, Richard Warren, John Howland, Stephen Plopkins, Edward TUly, 
John Tilly, Peter Brown, Richard Britteridge, George Soule, Richard Clark, Richard Gardiner, 
Francis Cook, Thomas Rogers, Thomas Tinker, John Ridgdale, Edward Fuller, John Turner, Fran- 
cis Eaton, James Chilton, John Crackston, John BiUington, Moses Fletcher, Jolin Goodman, Degory 
Priest, Thomas Williams, Gilbert Winslow, Edward Margeson, John AUerton, Thomas English, Ed- 
ward Dotey, Edward Leister. Howland was Carver's seiwant ; Soule was Winslow's servant ; and 
Dotey and Leister were servants of Hopkins. 

" The foolish statement has often been made, that the Pilgrims intended to land at Manhattan 
Island (New York), but the commander of the May-Floivtr, having been bribed by the Dutch to do 
so, landed them further east beA'ond the Dutch possessions. The story is a fable. Coppin, the 
pilot, had been on the coast of New England before, and, in navigating the May-Floiver, he only 
foUoM'ed his old track. 

^ The following is a copy of the instrument: "In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names 
are underwritten, the loyal subjects of our dread sovereign lord, king James, by the grace of God, 
of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, king, defender of the faith, etc, having undertaken, for the glory 
of God and the advancement of the Christian faith, and honor ot our king and country, a voyage to 
plant the first colony in the northern parts of Virginia, do, by these presents, solemnly and mutually, 
in the presence of God and of one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil 
body politic, for our better ordering and preservation, and furtherance of the ends aforesaid ; and by 
virtue hereof, to enact, constitute, and frame just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, 
and offices from tune to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient tbr the general good 
of the colony ; unto wliich we promise all due submission and obedience. In witness whereof we 
have hereto subscribed our names, at Cape Cod, the 1 1th of November, in the year of the reign of 
our sovereign Lord, Iving James of England, France, and Ireland, the Eighteenth, and of Scotland 
the Fifty -fourth. Anno Domini, 1620." 

* John Carver was born in England, went with Robinson to Holland, and on the 3d of April, 
1621, while governor of the Plymouth colony, he died. 
. * Their leader was Miles Standish, a brave soldier, who had served in the Netherlands. He 
was very active in the colony as miUtary commander-in-chief, in both fighting and treating with the 
Indians, and is called "The Hero of New England." He was a magistrate many years, and died 
at Duxbury, Massacliusetts, m 1656. 

" While the explorers were searching for a landing-place, the wife of Wilham White, a bride but 
a short time before leaving Holland, gave birth to a son, "the first Englishman bom in New En- 
gland." They named him Peregrine, and the cradle in which he was rocked is yet preserved. He 
died in Marshfield in 1704. 







-^ 










2!I]SISTIIK[S ■[ 



.msFom c^^'^riEM ivMiE) MMkSs^s^nir^ 



J680.] NEW HAMPSHIRE. 79 

New Plymouth, and there a flourishing village is now spread out/ Dreary, 
indeed, was the prospect before them. Exposure and priva- 
tions had prostrated one half of the men before the first blow 
of the axe had been struck to erect a habitation. Faith and 
hope nerved the arms of the healthy, and they began to build. 
One by one perished. The governor and his wife died on 
the 3d of April, 1621 ; and on the first of that month, forty- 
six of the one hundred immigrants were in their graves. Nine- 
teen of these were signers to the Constitution. At one time chair.* 
only seven men were capable of assisting the sick. Fortun- 
ately, the neighboring tribes, weakened by a pestilence,^ did not molest them. 
Spring and summer came. Game became plenty in the forest, and they caught 
many fishes from the waters. They sowed and reaped, and soon friends from 
England joined them.^ The settlement, begun with so much sorrow and suifer- 
ing, became permanent, and then and there the foundations of the common- 
wealth of Massachusetts were laid. 




CHAPTER lY. 

NEW HAMPSHIRE. [1622-1680.] 

The enterprising Sir Fernando Gorges, who, for many years, had been 
engaged in traffic with the Indians on the New England coast, projected a set- 
tlement further eastward than Plymouth, and for that purpose became associ- 
ated with John Mason, a merchant, afterward a naval commander, and always 
"a man of action." Mason was secretary to the Plymouth Council, for New 
England,^ and was Avell acquainted with all matters pertaining to settlements in 
the New World. Gorges and Mason obtained a grant of land in 1622, extend- 
ing from the Merrimac to the Kennebec, and inland to the St. Lawrence. 
They named the territory Laconia. Mason had obtained a grant the previous 
year, extending from Salem to the mouth of the Merrimac, which he had named 
Mariana. The same year, a colony of fishermen, under David Thompson, 
seated themselves at Little Harbor, on the Piscataqua River, just below Ports- 
mouth. Another party, under two brothers named Hilton, London fishmong- 
ers, commenced a settlement, in 1623, a few miles above, at Dover ; but these 
irere only fishing stations, and did not flourish. 



' " Plymouth Rock " is famous. It was broken into two pieces. One part remained in its oriff - 
inal position at Hedge's Wiiarf, Plymouth ; the other was taken to the centre of the town and 
surrounded by an iron railiug. In 1880, this portion, which had been dragged into Plymouth by 
'<!0 yoke of oxen, iu 1774, and over which the Whigs [note 4, page 226] erected a liberty pole, 
was returned to its original position . 

^ This was the throne upon which sat the first Christian monarch of New England. Governor 
Carver was at the head of a new State, and, as chief magistrate, held the same relative position an 
king James of England, whose seat was richly ornamented and covered with a canopy of silk and 
gold. 3 Page 114. •• Page 115. » Page 74 



go SETTLEMENTS. [1634. 

In the year 1629, the Rev. Mr. Wheelwright (a brother-in-law of the cele- 
brated Anne Hutchinson, Avho was banished from the Massachusetts colony on 
a charge of sedition, in 1637) purchased from the Indians the wilderness be- 
tween the Merrimac and the Piscataqua, and founded Exeter. The same year 
Mason obtained from Gorges exclusive ownership of that same portion of La- 
CONIA. He named the domain New Hampshire, and in 1631 built a house 
upon the site of Portsmouth, the name which he gave to the spot.' Other set- 
tlements upon the Piscataqua, and along the present coast of Maine, as far aa 
Portland, Avere attempted. At the latter place a company had a grant of land 
forty miles square, and formed an agricultural settlement in 1631, called 
LlGONiA.^ Pemaquid Point was another settlement, which remained an inde- 
pendent community for almost forty years. Trading houses were established 
as far east as Machias, but they were broken up by the French, and the west- 
ern limits of Acadie were fixed at Pemaquid Point, about half way from 
the Penobscot to the Kennebec. The several feeble and scattered settlements^ 
in New Hampshire formed a coalition with the flourishing Massachusetts colony 
in 1841, and remained dependencies ot that province until 1680, when they 
were separated by order of the king, and New Hampshire became a royal prov- 
ince. Its first government consisted of a governor and council appointed by 
♦•.he king, and a house of representatives elected by the people. Then was 
founded the commonwealth of New Hampshire« 



CHAPTER y. 

MARYLAND. [1634.] 

A LARGE portion of the American colonies were the fruitful growth of the 
seeds of civil liberty, wafted hither by the fierce gales of oppression in some 

' Mason had been governor of Portsmouth, in Hampshire County, England, and these names 
were given in memoiy of his former residence. 

* The people of these eastern settlements, which formed the basis of the present commonwealth 
of Maine, did not like the government attempted to be established by the proprietor, and, taking 
pohtical power into their own hands, placed themselves under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts in 
1652. The territory was erected into a county, and called Yorkshire. In 1621, king James, as 
sovereign of Scotland, placed the Scottish seal to a charter granting to Sir WiUiam Alexander, after- 
ward [1633] earl of Stirling, the whole territory eastward of the State of Maine, under the title of 
Nova Scotia, or New Scotland. The French had already occupied places along the coast, and called 
the country Acadie. The Scotch proprietor never attempted settlements, either in this territory or in 
Canada which Charles the First had granted to him, and the whole country had passed into the hands 
of the French, by treaty. The earl died in 1640, and all connection of his family with Nova Scotia 
ceased. His title was held afterward by four successors, the last of whom died in 1739. In 1759, 
William Alexander (General Lord Stirling during our War for Independence) made an unsuccessful 
claim to the title. The next claimant was Alexander Humphrey, who commenced operations in 
the Scottish courts in 1815, and by forgeries and frauds was partially successful. The whole was 
exposed in 1833. Humphrey was in this country in 1852, pressing his claims to the monopoly of 
the Eastern Fisheries, by virtue of the grants of kings James and Charles more than two hundred 
years ago.) 



1634.] MARYLAND. 81 

form. Maryland, occupying a space between North and South Virginia.* was 
first settled by persecuted Roman Catholics from England and Ireland- While 
king James worried the Puritans on one hand, for non-conformity,^ the Roman 
Catholics, at the other end of the religious scale, were subjected to even more 
severe penalties. As the Puritans increased in numbers and influence, their 
cry against the Roman Catholics grew louder and fiercer ; and, while defend- 
ing themselves from persecution with one hand, they were inflicting as severe a 
lash upon the Romanists with the other. Thus subjected to twofold opposition, 
the condition of the Roman Catholics became deplorable, and, in common with 
other sufierers for opinion's sake, their eyes were turned toward free America. 
Among the most influential professors of Catholicism was George Calvert, an 
active member of the London Company,^ and Secretary of State at the time 
when the Pilgrims^ were preparing to emigrate to America. He was so much 
more loyal in action to his sovereign than to his faith, that he did not lose the 
king's favor, although frankly professing to be a Roman Catholic ; and for his 
services he was created an Irish peer in 1625, with the title of Lord Baltimore. 
He also obtained from James, a grant [1622] to plant a Roman Catholic colony 
on a portion of Newfoundland. He called the territory Avalon, but his schsme 
was not successful. The barren soil, and French aggressors from Acadie, were 
too much for the industry and courage of his colonists, and the settlement was 
abandoned. 

Foiled in his projects in the east. Lord Baltimore went to Virginia in 1628, 
with a view of establishing a colony of his brethren there. But he found the 
Virginians as intolerant as the crown or the Puritans, and he turned his back 
upon their narrow prejudices, and went to examine the beautiful, unoccupied 
region beyond the Potomac. He was pleased with the country, and applied for 
a charter to establish a colony there. The London Company was now dis- 
solved,^ and the soil had become the property of the monarch. King Charles 
the First, then on the throne, readily granted a charter, but before it was com- 
pleted, Lord Baltimore died. This event occurred on the 25th of April, 1632, 
and on the 20th of June following, the patent was issued to Cecil, liis son and 
heir. In honor of the queen, Henrietta jNIaria,'' the 
province was called Maryland. The territory de- 
fined in the charter extended along each side of 
Chesapeake Bay, from the 30th to the 40th degree 
of north latitude, its western line being the waters of 
the Potomac. 

It is believed that the Maryland charter was 
drawn by the first Lord Baltimore's own hand. It 
was the most liberal one yet granted by an English 
monarch, both in respect of the proprietor and the 
settlers. The government of the province was inde- ^^^^^' second lord baltimorr 




' Page 63. » JTote 2, page 76. ^ == Page 63. ■• Page "77. ^ Page 107 

" She was a Roman Catholic, and sister of Louis the Thirteenth of France. 



82 SETTLEMENTS. [1632. 

pendent of the crown, and equality in religious rights and civil freedom was 
secured to every Christian sect. Unitarians, or those who denied the doctrine 
of the Trinity, as well as all unbelievers in Divine revelation, were not covered 
by this mantle of toleration. The king had no power to levy the smallest tax 
upon the colonists, and all laws were invalid until sanctioned by a majority of 
the freemen, or their deputies. Under such a wise and liberal charter the 
colony, when planted, flourished remarkably, for those persecuted by the 
Puritans in New England, and the Churchmen in Virginia, there sought 
refuge, and found peace. 

Emigration to Maryland commenced in 1633. The first company, mostly 
Protestants, sailed for America on the 2d of December of that year, under 
Leonard Culvert, brother of the proprietor, and axpointed govei'nor of 
the province. They arrived in March, 1634, and after sailing up the Potomac, 
as far as Mount Vernon, tliey descended the stream, almost to 'its mouth. 
They landed upon an estuary of the Chesapeake, purchased an Indian village, 
and laid the foundation of a town [April, 1634 J, which they named St. Mary.' 
The honesty of Calvert, in paying for the land, secured the good will of the 
Indians ; and, unlike the first settlers of most of the other colonies, they experi- 
enced no sufferings from want, or the hostilities of the Aboriginals.' 

Popular government was first organized in Maryland on the 8th of March, 
1635, when the first legislative assembly was convened at St. Mary. Every 
freeman being allowed to vote, it was a purely democratic legislature. As the 
number of colonists increased, this method of making laws was found to be in- 
convenient, and in 1639, a representative government was established, the 
people being allowed to send as many delegates as they pleased. The first rep- 
resentative assembly made a declaration of rights, defined the powers of the 
proprietor, and took measures to secure to the colonists all the civil liberties 
enjoyed by the people of Old England. Then was founded the commonwealth 
of Maryland. 



CHAPTER VI. 

CONNECTICUT. [1632 — 1639.] 

Adrian Block," the Dutch navigator, discovered and explored the Con- 
necticut River, as far as the site of Hartford, in 1614, and named it Versche, 

' Trading posts were established a little earlier than this, within the Maryland province. In 
1631, WiUiam Claybome obtained a license from the king to traffic with the Indians ; and when 
Calvert and his company came, he had two settlements, one on Kent Island, nearly opposite An- 
napohs, and another at the present Havre de Grace, at the mouth of the Susquehannah. He refused 
to acknowledge the authority of Baltimore, and trouble ensued. He collected his people on the 
eastern shore of Maryland in 1635, with a determination to defend his claims by force of arms; and 
in May quite a severe skirmish ensued between his forces and those of the colonists. Clayborne's 
men were taken prisoners, and he fled to Virginia. He was declared guilty of treason, and sent to 
England for trial. His estates were forfeited ; but, being acquitted of the charge, he returned to 
Maryland and incited a rebellion. See page 151. " Page 72. 




HnoKKR's EMTr,R\TioN' TO Coxxi 



1639.] CONNECTICUT. 85 

or Fj-esh Water River.* Soon afterward Dutch traders were upon its banks, 
and might have carried on a peaceful and profitable traffic with the Indians, had 
honor and honesty marked their course. But the avaricious agent of the Dutch, 
imprisoned an Indian chief on board his vessel, and would not release him until 
one hundred and forty fathoms of wampum^ had been paid. The exasperated 
Indians menaced the traders, and near the site of Hartford, at a place yet known 
as Dutch Point, the latter commenced the erection of a fort. The Indians were 
finally conciliated, and, at their request, the fort was abandoned for awhile. 

A friendly intercourse was opened between the Dutch of New Netherland 
and the Puritans in 1627.^ With the guise of friendship, but really for the 
purpose of strengthening the claims of the Dutch to the Connecticut valley, by 
having an English settlement there under the jurisdiction of New Netherland, 
Governor Minuit^ advised the Puritans to leave the barren land of Massachusetts 
Bay, and settle in the fertile region of the Fresh Water River. In 1631, a 
Mohegan chief, then at war with the powerful Pequods,^ desirous of having a 
strong barrier between himself and his foes, urged the English to come and 
settle in the Connecticut valley. The Puritans clearly perceived the selfish 
policy of both parties, and hesitated to leave. The following year [1632], 
however. Governor Winslow, of the Plymouth colony, * visited that fertile region, 
and, delighted with its appearance, resolved to promote emigration thither. 
In the mean while, the Council of Plymouth^ had granted the soil of Connecticut 
[1630] to the Earl of Warwicke, who, in 1631, transferred his interest to Lord 
Say-and-Seal, Lord Brooke, John Hampden, and others. The eastern bound- 
ary of the territory was " Narraganset River," and the western (like all other 
charters at that time) was the South Sea, or Pacific Ocean.* The Dutch 
became appris d of these movements of the English ; and perceiving no advan- 
tage (but detriment) to themselves, they purchased of the Indians the land at 
Hartford and vicinity, completed their fort, and placed two cannons upon it, in 
1633, with the intention of preventing the English ascending the river. 

Although the Plymouth people were aware jf the preparations made by 
the Dutch, to defend their claim, they did not hesitate, and in October, 1633, 
Captain William Holmes. and a chosen company arrived in the Connecticut 
River, in a sloop. Holmes bore a commission from Governor Winslow to make 
a settlement, and brought with him the frame of a house. When he approached 
the Dut(4h fort, the commander menaced him with destruction if he attempted 
to pass it. Holmes was not intimidated, and sailing by unhurt, he landed at 
the site of Windsor, and there erected his house. Seventy men Avere sent by 
the Dutch the following year, to drive him from the country. They were kept 
at bay, and finally a parley resulted in peaceful relations.' Holmes's colony 
flourished, and in the autumn of 1635, a party of sixty men, women, and chil- 
dren, from the Puritan settlements, commenced a journey through the wilder- 

■ Connecticut is the Englishorthoaraphy of the Indian word Quon-eh-ta-cut, which signifies "the 
Jong river." ^ Probalaly about four hundred dollars. See note 2, page 13. 

' Page 75. * Page 139. " Page 21. » Page 79. 

Page 74. " Page 42. '' See note 2, page 142. 



gg st:ttlemexts. [1632. 

ness [Oct. 25] to join Iiim. Yv^itli tlicii- cattle/ they made their slow and drear j 

way a hundred miles through dark forests and dismal swamps ; and when they 

arrived upon the banks of the Connecticut [Nov. 25], the ground was covered 

with deep snow, and the river was frozen. It was a winter of great trial for 

them. Mmnj cattle perished. ^ A vessel bearing food for the colony was lost 

on the coast, and the settlei'S were compelled to subsist upon acorns, and scanty 

supplies of Indian corn from the natives. Many of them made their way to the 

fort, then just erected at Saybrook, near the mouth of the river, and returned 

to Boston by water. Spring opened, and the necessities of 

^ I those who remained were supplied. They erected a small 

house for Arorship on the site of Hartford, and in April, 

" x^> 1636, the first court, or organized government was held 

,— .^ ^ -1H ^,-. there. At about the time when this company departed, a 

" ^ ^ ^ '' " ',^j^ son of Governor Winthrop,' of Massachusetts, Hugh Peters, 

■^ '-^ and Henry Vane, arrived at Boston from England, as com- 

„,^^^ , missioners for the proprietors of Connecticut, with instruc- 

tions to build a fort at the mouth of the river of that name, 

and to plant a colony there. Tli« fort was speedily built, and the settlement 

was named Saybrook, in honor of the two peers named in the charter.'' 

Another migration of Puritans to the Connecticut valley, more important, 
and with better results, now took place. In June, 1636, Rev. Thomas Hooker, 
the " li"-ht of the western churches,"" with other ministers, their families, and 
flocks, in all about one hundred, left the vicinity of Boston for the new land 
of promise. It was a toilsome journey through the swamps and forests. They 
subsisted upon berries and the milk of their coavs which they took with them, 
and on the 4th of July, they stood upon the beautiful banks of tl: j Connecticut. 
On the 9 th, INIr. Hooker preached and administered thecommuniOn in the little^ 
meeting-house at Hartford, and there a great portion of the company settled. 
Some chose Wethersfield for a residence ; and others, from Roxbury, went up 
the river twenty miles, and settled at Springfield. There Avere now five dis- 
tinct English settlements upon the Connecticut River, yet they were scattered 
and Aveak. 

Clouds soon appeared in the morning sky, and the settlers in the Connecti- 
cut valley perceived the gathering of a fearful storm. The poAverful Pequod 
Indians" became jealous of the Avhite people, because they appeared 4o be the 
friends of their enemies, the INIohegans on the Avest, and of their more poAverful 
foes, the Narragansetts, on the east. They first commenced petty annoyances ; 
then kidnapped children, murdered men in the forests, and attacked families on 



' This was tlie first introduction of cattle into Connecticut. 

* The loss in cattle was estimated at about one thousand dollars. 

» Page 117. ' Page 85. 

^ Thomas Hooker was a native of Leicestershire, England, where he was born in 1S86. He 
was silenced, because of his non-conformity, in 1630, when he left the ministry, and founded a 
grammar scliool at Cambridge. He was compelled to flee to Holland, fi'om ^sdience he came to 
America with Mr. Cotton, in 1633. He was a man of great benevolence, and was eminently use- 
ful. He died in July, 1647, at the age of sixty-one years. •= Page 21. 



1639.] CONNECTICUT, 87 

the outskirts of the settlement at Saybrook. Their allies of Block Island' cap- 
tured a Massachusetts trading vessel, killed the captain' [July. 1036], and 
plundered her. The Puritans in the east were alarmed and indignant, and an 
inefficient expedition from Boston and vicinity penetrated the Pequod country. 
It did more harm than good, for it resulted oiily in increasing the hatred and 
hostility of the savages. The Pequods became bolder, and finally sought an 
alliance with their enemies, the Narragansetts, in an effort to exterminate the 
white people. At this critical moment a deliverer appeared when least expected. 
Roger Williams, who for his tolerant opinions had been banished from 
Massachusetts, 3 was now a friendly resident in the country of the Narragan- 
setts. and heard of the proposed alliance. Forgetting the many injuries he had 
received, he warned the doomed people of the Bay colony, of impending danger. 
At the risk of his own life, he descended Nan-aganset Bay in an open canoe, 
on a stor-my day, and visited Miantonomoh, the renowned sachem, at his 
seat near Newport, while the Pequod embassadors were there in council. The 
latter menaced Williams Avith death ; yet that good man remained there three 
days, and effectually prevented the alliance.** And more — he induced the Nar- 
ragansetts to renew hostilities with the Peqviods. By this generous service the 
infant settlements were saved from destruction. 

Although foiled in their attempt at alliance, the Pequods were not dis- 
heartened. During the ensuing winter they continued their murderous depre- 
dations. In the spring, the authorities of the English settlements on the 
Connecticut declared war against the Pequods [May, 1637], and the Massachu- 
setts and Plymouth colonies agreed to aid them. Soon, Captain Mason, who 
Was in command of the fort at Saybrook,'' and Captain John Underbill, a brave 
and restless man, sailed in some pinnaces, wuth about eighty white men and 
seventy Mohegan Indians under Uncas,*^ for Narraganset Bay. There Mian- 
tonomoh, with two hundred warriors, joined them, and they marched for the 
Pequod country. Their ranks were swollen by the bravo Niantics and others, 
until five hundred "bowmen and spearmen" were in the train of Captains 
Mason and Underbill. 

The chief sachem of the Pequods, was Sassacus, a fierce warrior, and the 
terror of the New England tribes.' He could summon almost two thousand 
warriors to the field ; and feeling confident in his strength, he was not properly 
vigilant. His chief fort and village on the IMystic River, eight miles north- 
east of New London, was surprised at dawn the 5th of June, 1G37, and 
before sun-rise, more than six hundred men, women, and children, perished by 
fire and sword. Only seven escaped to spread the dreadful intelligence abroad. 
and arouse the surviving warriors. The Narragansetts turned homeward, and 
the English, aware of great peril, pressed forward to Groton on the Thames, 



' This island, which lies nearly south from the eastern border of Connecticut, was visited Ijv 
Adrian Block, the Dutch navigator, and was called by his name. At the time in question, it was 
thickly populated with fierce Indians. 

'' John Oldham, the first overland explorer of the Connecticut River. ^ Page 89. 

* Page 91. ^ Page 85. ^ Page 21. ^ Page 22. 



88 SETTLEMENTS. [1632. 

and there embarked for Saybrook. Thej had lost only two killed, and les3 
than twenty Avounded. 

The brave Sassacus had hardly recovered from this shock, when almost a 
hundred armed settlers, from Massachusetts, under Captain Stoughton, arrived 
at Saybrook. The terrified Pequods made no resistance, but fled in dismay 
toward the Avilderness westward, hotly pursued by the English. Terrible was 
the destruction in the path of the pursuers. Throughout the beautiful country 
on Long Island Sound, from Saybrook to New Haven, wigwams and cornfields 
were destroyed, and helpless Avomen and children were slain. With Sassacus 
at their head, the Indians flew like deer before the hounds, and finally took 
shelter in Sasco SAvamp, near Fairfield, Avhere, after a severe battle, they all 
surrendered, except Sassacus and a fcAV followers. These fled to the MohaAvks,* 
where the sachem Avas treacherously murdered, and his people were sold into 
slavery, or incorporated Avith other tribes. The blow was one of extermination, 
relentless and cruel. " There did not remain a sannup or squaAv, a Avarrior or 
child of the Pequod name. A nation had disappeared in a day." The New 
England tribes- Avere filled Avith aAve, and for forty years tbe colonists Avere 
unmolested by them. 

With the return of peace, the spirit of adventure revived. In the summer 
of 1637, John Davenport, an eminent non-conformist' minister of London, with 
Theophilus Eaton and EdAvard Hopkins, rich merchants Avho represented a 
wealthy company, arrived at Boston. They Avere cordially received, and 
urgently solicited to settle in that colony. The Hutchinson conti'oversy* Avas 
then at its height ; and perceiving the religious agitations of the people, they 
resolved to found a settlement in the wilderness. The sagacious Puritans, 
while pursuing the Pequods, had discovered the beauty and fertility of the 
country along the Sound from the Connecticut to Fairfield, and Davenport and 
his companions heard their report Avith joy. Eaton and a fcAV others explored 
the coast in autumn, and erecting a hut* near the Quinipiac Creek (the site of 
New Haven), they passed the Avinter there, and selected it for a settlement. 
In the spring [April 13, 1638] Davenport and others followed, and under a 
wide-spreading oak,^ the good minister preached his first sermon. They pur- 
chased the lands at Quinipiac of the Indians, and, taking the Bible for their 
guide, they formed an independent goA^ernment, or " plantation covenant,'' upon 
strictly religious principles. Prosperity blessed them, and they laid the found- 
ations of a city, and called it Neav Havex. The folloAving year, the settlers 
at Windsor, Hartford, and Wethersfield, met in convention at Hartford [Jan- 
uary 24, 1639 J, and adopted a AA'ritten constitution, Avhich contained very liberal 
provisions. It ordained that the governor and legislature should be elected 
annually, by the people, and they were required to take an oath of allegiance 
to the commonwealth, and not to the king. The General Assembly, alone, 



Page 23. ^ Page 22. ' Note 2, page T6. * Page 120. 

On the corner of Church and George-streets, New Haven. 

At the intersection of George and College-streets, New Haven. 



1636.] P.IIODE ISLAND. ' 89 

could make or repeal laws ; and in ev^er j matter the voice of the people was 
heard. This was termed the Connecticut Colony ; and, notwithstanding it 
and the New Haven colony were not united until 1665, now was laid the found- 
ation of the commonwealth of Connecticut, which was governed by the 
Hartford Constitution for more than a century and a half 



CHAPTER YII. 

RHODE ISLAND. [IG3G— IG43.] 

The seed of the Rhode Island commonwealth was planted by bravo hands, 
made strong by persecution. The first settler in Ilhode Island was William 
Blackstone, a non-conformist minister,' who was also the first resident upon the 
peninsula of Shawmut, where Boston now stands.'* Not liking the " lords 
brethren" in Massachusetts any more than the "lords bishops" of England, 
from whose frowns he had fled, he withdrew to the wilderness, and dwelt high 
up on the Seekonk or Pawtucket River, which portion of the stream still bears 
his name. There he planted, and called the place Rehoboth.' Although he 
was the first se^/f/er, Blackstone was not the founder of Rhode Island. He 
always held allegiance to INIassachusetts, and did not aspire to a higher dignity 
than that of an exile for conscience' sake. 

Roger Williams, an ardent young minister at Salem, ■• became the instru- 
ment of establishing the foundations of a now commonwealth in the Avilderness. 
When he was banished from Mass. chusetts, toward the close of 1635,^ he 
crossed the borders of civilization, and found liberty and toleration among the 
heathen. After his sentence,'^ his bigoted persecutors began to dread the influ- 
ence of his enlightened principles, if he should plant a settlement beyond the 
limits of existing colonies, and they resolved to detain him. Informed of 
their scheme, he withdrew from Salem in the dead of Avinter [Jan., 1636], and 
through deep snows he traversed the forests alone, for fourteen weeks, sheltered 
only by the rude wigwam of the Indian, until he found the hospitable cabin^ of 

* Note 2, page 76. = Page 118. 

' Room. The name was significant of his aim — he wanted room outside of the narrow confines 
of what he deemed Puritan intolerance. 

■* Roger WLlIiams was born in Wales, in 1599, and was educated at Oxford. Persecution drove 
him to America in 1 63 1, when he was ciiosen assistant minister at Salem. His extreme toleration 
did not find there a genial atmosphere, and he went to Plymouth. There, too, he was regarded 
with suspicion. He returned to Salem in 1634, formed a separate congregation, and in 1635, the 
general court of Massachusetts passed sentence of banishment against him. He lalDored zealously 
in founding the colony of Rhode Island, and had no difficulty with any people who came there, 
except the Quakers. He died at Providence, in April, 1683, at the age of eighty-four years. 

^ Page 119. 

' Williams was allowed six weeks after the pronunciation of his sentence to prepare for his 
departure. 

Massasoit had become acquainted -with the manner of building cabins adopted by the settlers 
at fishing-stations on the coast, and had constructed one for himself. They were much more com- 
fortable than wigwams. See page 13. 



90 



SETTLEMENTS. 



[1636. 



Massasoit, the chief sachem of the Wampanoags,' at Mount Hope. There he 
was entertained until the buds appeared, Avhen, being joined bj five friends from 
Boston, he seated himself upon the Seekonk, some distance below Blackstone"s 
plantation. He found himself within the territory of the Plymouth Company.' 
Governor Winslow^ advised him to cross into the Narragansett country, where 
he could not be molested. With his companions he embarked in a light canoe, 
paddled around to the head of Narraganset Bay, and upon a green slope, near 
a spring/ they prayed, and chose the spot for a settlement. Williams obtained 




a grant of land from Canonicus, chief sachem of the Narragansetts, and in com- 
memoration of " God's merciful providence to him in his distress," he called the 
place Providence. 

The freedom enjoyed there was soon spoken of at Boston, and persecuted 
men fled thither for refuge. Persons of every creed were allowed full liberty 
of conscience, and lived together happily. The same liberty was allowed in 
politics as in religion; and a pure democracy was established there. Each 
settler was required to subscribe to an agreement, that he would submit to such 
rules, "not affecting the conscience," as a majority of the inhabitants should 
adopt for the public good. Williams reserved no political power to himself, and 
the leader and follower had equal dignity and privileges. The government was 



' Page 22. ^ Page 63. => Page 85. 

* This spring is now [1881] beneath some fine sycamores on tlie west side of Benefit street, in 
Providence. 



1643.] RHODE ISLAND. 91 

entirely in the hands of the people. Canonicus, the powerful Narragansett 
chief, became much attached to Williams, and his influence among them, as we 
have seen,' Avas very great. He saved his persecutors from destruction, jet 
they had not the Christian manliness to remove the sentence of banishment, and 
receive him to their bosoms as a brother. He could not compress his enlarged 
views into the narrow compass of their creed ; and so, while they rejoiced in 
their deliverance, they anathematized their deliverer as a heretic and an outcast. 
But he enjoyed the favor of God. His settlement was entirely unmolested 
during the Pequod war," and it prospered Avonderfully. 

Roger Williams opened his arms wide to the persecuted. Early in 1638, 
while Mrs. Hutchinson was yet in prison in Boston,^ her husband, with Wil- 
liam Coddington, Dr. John Clarke, and sixteen others, of concurrent religious 
views, ^ accepted the invitation of Williams to settle in his vicinity. Mianto- 
nomoh gave them the beautiful island of Aquiday^ for forty fathoms of white 
wampum.'' They called it Isle of Rhodes, because of its fancied resemblance to 
the island of that name in the Levant, and upon its northern verge they planted 
a settlement, .and named it Portsmouth. A covenant, similar to the one used 
by Williams,'' was signed by the settlers ; and, in imitation of the Jewish form 
of government under the judges, Coddington was chosen judge, or chief ruler, 
with three assistants. Others soon came from Boston ; and in 1639, Newport, 
toAvard the lower extremity of the island, was founded. Liberty of conscience 
was absolute ; love was the social and political bond, and upon the seal which 
they adopted Avas the motto, Amor vincit omnia — "Love is all-powerful." 
Although the Rhode Island and the Providence plantations were separate in 
government, they Avere united in interest and aim. Unwilling to acknowledge 
allegiance to either Massachusetts or Plymouth,^ they sought an independent 
charter. For that purpose Roger Williams Avent to England in 1643. The 
Avhole parent country Avas then convulsed with civil Avar.^ After much delay, 
he obtained from Parliament (which Avas then contending fiercely with the 
king) a free charter of incorporation, dated March 24, 1644, and all the settle- 
ments Avere united under the general title of Rhode Island and Providence 
Plantations. Then was founded the commonAvealth of Rhode Island. 



^ Page 87. "" Page 87. ' Page 120. " Note 2, page 120. 

^ This was the Indian name of Rhode Island. It is a Narragansett word, signifying Peaceable 
Isk. It is sometimes spelled Aquitneck, and Aquitnet. 

* Note 2, page 13. They also gave the Indians ten coats and twenty hoes, on condition that 
they should leave the island before the next winter. 

^ Page 90. The following is a copy of the government compact : " We, whose names are 
Tmderwritten, do swear solemnly, in the presence of Jehovah, to incorporate ourselves into a body 
pohtic, and, as He sliall help us, will submit our persons, lives, and estates, unto our Lord Jesus 
Christ, the King of kings, and Lord of Hosts, and to all those most perfect and absolute laws of His, 
given us in His holy TV'ord of truth, to be guided and judged thereby." 

* This unwillingness caused the other New England colonies to refuse the application of Rhode 
Island to become one of the Confederacy, in ] 643. See page 121. 

» Note 3, page 108. 



92 SETTLEMENTS. [1631. 

CHAPTER YIII. 

DELAWARE, NEW JERSEY, AND PENNSTLVANIA. [1G31— 1682.] 

It is difficult to draw the line of demarcation between the first permanent 
settlements in the provinces of Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, for 
they bore such intimate relations to each other that they may be appropriately 
considei-ed as parts of one episode in the history of American colonization. We 
shall, therefore, consider these settlements, in close connection, in one chapter, 
commencing with 

D E L A w A R :: . 

It was claimed by the Dutch, that the territory of New Netherland' ex- 
tended soithward to Cape Henlopen. In June, 1629, Samuel Godyn and 
others purchased of the natives the territory between the Cape and the mouth 
of the Delaware River. The following year, two ships, fitted out by Captain 
De Vries and others, and placed under the command of Peter Heyes, sailed 
from the Texel [Dec. 12, 1630] for America. One vessel was captured ; the 
other arrived in April, 1631 ; and near the present town of Lewiston, in 
Delaware, thirty immigrants, with implements and cattle, seated themselves. 
Heyes returned to Holland, and reported to Captain De Vries.' That mariner 
visited America early the following year [1632], but the little colony left by 
Heyes was not to be found. Difficulties with the Indians had provoked savage 
vengeance, and they had exterminated the white people. 

Information respecting the fine country along the Delaware had spread 
northward, and soon a competitor for a place on the South River, as it was 
called, appeared. Usselincx, an original projector of the Dutch West India 
Company,^ becoming dissatisfied with his associates, visited Sweden, and laid 
before the enlightened monarch, Gustavus Adolphus, well-arranged plans for a 
Swedish colony in the New World. The king Avas delighted, for his attention 
had already been turned toward America ; and his benevolent heart was full of 
desires to plant a free colony there, which should become an asylum for all 
persecuted Christians. While his scheme was ripening, the danger which 
menaced Protestantism in Germany, called him to the field, to contend for the 
principles of the Reformation.^ He marched from his kingdom with a strong 
army to oppose the Imperial hosts marshaled under the banner of the Pope on 
the fields of Germany. Yet the care and tumults of the camp and field did not 
make him forget his benevolent designs ; and only a few days before his death, 

* Page 72. 

^ De Vries was an eminent navigator, and one of Godyn's friends. To secure his valuable 
services, the purchasers made him a partner in their enterprise, with patroon [page 139] privileges, 
and the first expedition was arranged by him. He afterward came to America, and was one of 
the most active men in the Dutch colonies. On liis return to Holland, he published an account of 
his voyages. ^ Page 72. * Note 14, page 62. 



1682.] NEW JERSEY. 93 

at the battle of Lutzen [Nov. 6, 1632], Gustavus recommended the enterprise 
as "■ the jewel of his kingdom." 

The successor of Gustavus was his daughter Christina, then only six years 
of age. The government was administered by a regency,' at the head of which 
was Axel, count of Oxenstierna. He was the earliest and most ardent sup- 
porter of the proposed great enterprise of Gustavus ; and in 1634 he issued a 
charter for the Swedish West India Company. Peter Minuit,^ who had been 
recalled from the governorship of New Netherland, and was also dissatisfied 
with the Dutch West India Company, went to Stockholm, and offered his serv- 
ices to the new corporation. They were accepted, and toward the close of 163T 
he sailed from Gt)ttenburg with fifty emigrants, to plant a colony on the west 
side of the Delaware. He landed on the site of New Castle, in April, 1638, 
and purchased from the Indians^ the territory between Cape Henlopen and the 
Falls of the Delaware, at Trenton. They built a church and fort on the site 
of Wilmington, called the place Christina, and gave the name of New Sweden 
to the territory. The jealousy of the Dutch was aroused by this " intrusion," 
and they hurled protests and menaces against the Swedes.* The latter contin- 
ued to increase by immigration ; new settlements were planted ; and upon Tin- 
icum Island, a little below Philadelphia, they laid the foundations of a capital 
for a Swedish province. ^ The Dutch West India Company"^ finally resolved to 
expel or subdue the Swedes. The latter made hostile demonstrations, and 
defied the power of the Dutch. The challenge was acted upon ; and toward 
the close of the summer of 1655, governor Stuyvesant, with a squadron of seven 
vessels, entered Delaware Bay.'' In September every Swedish fort and settle- 
ment was brought under his rule, and the capital on Tinicum Island was 
destroyed. The Swedes obtained honorable terms of capitulation ; and for 
twenty-five years they prospered under the rule of the Dutch and English pro- 
prietors of New Netherland. 

NEW JERSEY. 

All the territory of Nova C^sarea, as New Jersey was called by the 
English, was included in the New Netherland charter,^ and transient trading 
settlements were made [1622], first at Bergen, by a few Danes, and then on 
the Delaware. Early in 1623, the Dutch built a log fort near the mouth of 
Timber Creek, a few miles below Camden, and called it Nassau. ^ In June, 

' A regent is one who exercises the power of king or emperor, during the absence, incapacity, 
or childhood of the latter. For many years, George the Third of England was incapable of ruHng 
on account of his insanity, and his son who was to be his successor at his death, was called the 
Prince Regent, because Parhament had given him power to act as king, in the place of his father. 
In the case of Christina, three persons were appointed regents, or rulers. 

= Page 139. ^ ^j^^ Dgi^wares. See page 20. « Page 143. 

This was done about forty years before William Penn became proprietor of Pennsylvania. 

^ Page 72. ' Page 143. « Page 72. 

It was built under the direction of Captain Jacobus May, who had observed attempts made 
by a French sea-captain to set up the arms of France there. The fort was built of logs, and was 
little else than a rude block-house, with palissades. [See note 1, page 127.] A little garrison, left to 
protect it, was soon scattered, and the fort was abandoned. 



94 SETTLEMENTS. [1631. 

1623, four coviples, who had been married on the voyage from Amsterdam, 
were sent to plant a colony on the Delaware. They seated themselves upon 
the site of Gloucester, a little below Fort Nassau, and this was the commence- 
ment of settlements in West Jersey. 

Seven years later [1630] Michael Pauw bought from the Indians the lands 
extending from Hoboken to the Raritan, and also the whole of Staten Island, 
and named the territory Pavonia.' In this purchase, Bergen was included. 
Other settlements were attempted, but none were permanent. In 1631, Cap- 
tain Heyes, after establishing the Swedish colony at Lewiston,'- crossed the 
Delaware, and purchased Cape INIay^ from the Indians ; and from that point to 
Burlington, traders' huts were often seen. The English became possessors of 
New Netherland in 1664, and the Duke of York, to whom the province had 
been given,* conveyed to Lord Berkeley and Sir George Carteret [June 24, 
1664], all the territory between the North and South (Hudson and Delaware) 
Rivers, and northward to the line of forty-one degrees and forty minutes, under 
the title of Nova Ccesarea or New Jersey. Soon afterward several families 
from Long Island settled at Elizabethtown,^ and there planted the first fruitful 
seed of the New Jersey colony, for the one at Gloucester withered and died. 
The following year, Philip Carteret, who had been appointed governor of the 
new province, arrived with a charter, fair and liberal in all its provisions. It 
provided for a government to be composed of a representative assembly" chosen 
by the people, and a governor and council. The legislative powers resided in 
the assembly ; the executive powers were intrusted to the governor and his 
council. Then [1665] was laid the foundation of the commonwealth of New 
Jersey. 

PENNSYLVANIA. 

A new religious sect, called Quakers,' arose in England at about the com- 
mencement of the civil wars [1642 — 1651] which resulted in the death of 
Charles the First. Their preachers were the boldest, and yet the meekest of 
all non-conformists.'^ Purer than all other sects, they were hated and perse- 
cuted by all. Those who came to America for " conscience' sake" were perse- 
cuted by the Puritans of New England,* the Churchmen of Virginia and 
Maryland, and in a degree by the Dutch of New Amsterdam ; and only in 
Rhode Island did they enjoy freedom, and even there they did not always dwell 
in peace. In 1673, George Fox, the founder of the Quaker sect, visited all his 
brethren in America. He found them a despised people everywhere, and his 

' Until the period of our "War for Independence, the point of land in Pavonia, on which Jersey 
City, opposite New York, now stands, was called Paulus' Hook. Here was the scene of a bold 
exploit by Americans, under Major Henry Lee, in 1779. See page 298. 

* Page 92. ^ Named in honor of Captain Jacobus Mey, or May. * Page 159. 

* Page 159. ' Note 3, page 159. 

' This name was given by Justice Burnet, of Derby, in 1650, who was admonished by George 
Fox, when he was cited before the magistrate, to tremble and quake at the Word of the Lord, at the 
same time Fox quaked, as if stirred by mighty emotions. See page 122. 

" Note 2, page 76. • Page 76 



1682.] 



PEXXSTLVAXIA. 



95 



heart yearned for an asylum for his brethren. Among the most influential of 
his converts was William Penn/ son of the renowned admiral of that name. 
Through him the sect gained access to the ears of the nobility, and soon the 
Quakers possessed the western half of New Jersey, by purchase from Lord 
Berkeley.*' The first company of immigrants landed in the autumn of 1675, 
and named the place of debarkation Salem.^ They established a democratic 
form of government ; and, in November, 1681. the first legislative assembly of 
Quakers ever convened, met at Salem. 




While these events were progressing, Penn, who had been chief peace-maker 
-when disputes arose among the proprietors and the people, took measures to 
plant a new colony beyond the Delaware. He applied to Charles the Second 
for a charter. The king remembered the services of Admiral Penn,^ and gave 
his son a grant [March 14, 1681] of " three degrees of latitude by five degrees 



' 'Williani Penn. was born in London, in October, 1644, and was educated at Oxford. He was 
remarkable, in his youth, for brilliant talents ; and while a student, having heard the preaching of 
Quakers, he was drawn to them, and sutfered expulsion from his father's roof, in consequence. He 
went abroad, obtained courtly manners, studied law after his return, and was again driven from 
home for associating with Quakers. He then became a preacher among them, and remained in 
that connection until hfs death. After a^fe of great activity and considerable suffering, he died in 
England, in 1718, at the age of seventy-rour years. "^ Page 119. 

' Now the capital of Salem county. New Jersey. 

* He was a very efficient naval commander, and by his skill contributed to the defeat of the 
Dutch in 1664. The king gave him the title of Baion for his services. Note 15, page 62. 



96 sp:ttlements, [1631. 

of longitude west of the Delaware," and named the province Penfisyhatiia, in 
honor of the proprietor. It included the principal settlements of the Swedes. 
To these people, and others within the domain, Penn sent a proclamation, filled 
with the loftiest sentiments of republicanism. William Markham, who bore the 
proclamation, was appointed deputy-governof of the province, and with him 
sailed [May, 1681] quite a large company of immigrants, who Avere members 
or employees of the Coinpanij of Free Traders, ' who had purchased lands of 
the proprietor. In May, the following year, Penn published a frame of gov- 
ernment, and sent it to the settlers for their approval. It was not a constitu- 
tion, but a code of wholesome regulations for the people of the colony.' He 
soon afterAvard obtained by grant and purchase [Aug. 1682] the domain of the 
present State of Delaware, which the Duke of York claimed, notwithstanding it 
was clearly not his own. It comprised three counties, Newcastle, Kent, and 
Smssex, called The Territories. 

Penn had been anxious, for some time, to visit his colony, and toward the 
close of August, 1682, he sailed in the Welcome for America, with about one 
hundred emigrants. The voyage was long and tedious ; and when he arrived 
at Newcastle, in Delaware [Nov. 6], he found almost a thousand new comers 
there, some of whom had sailed before, and some after his departure from En- 
gland. He was joyfully received by the old settlers, who then numbered almost 
three thousand. The Swedes said, "It is the best day we have ever seen;" 
and they all gathered like children around a father. A few days afterward, he 
proceeded to Shackamaxon (now Kensington suburbs of Philadelphia), where, 
under a wide-spreading elm, as tradition declares, he entered into an honorable 
treaty with the Indians, for their lands, and established with them an everlast- 
ing covenant of peace and frieudship. " We meet," said Penn, " on the broad 
pathway of good f:\ith and good will; no advantage shall be taken on either 
side ; but all shall be openness and love." And so it wi'^. 

"Thou'lt find," said the Quaker, " in me and in mine, 
But friends and brothers to thee and thine, 
Who abuse no power and admit no line 

'Twijit the red man and the white. 

And briglit was tlie spot where tlie Qualcer came, 
To leave his hat, his drab, and his name, 
That will sweetly sound from the trump of Fame, 
Till its final blast shall die." 

On the day after his arrival, Penn received from the agents of the Duke of 
York,' in the presence of the people, a formal surrender of The Territories ; 



' Lands in the new province were offered for about ten cents an acre. Quite a number of pur- 
chasers united, and called themselves The Company of Free Traders, with whom Penn entered into 
an agreement concerning the occupation of the soil, laA'ing out of a city, &c. 

"^ It ordained a General Assembly or court, to consist(jf a governor, a council of seventy, chosen 
by the freemen of tlie colony, and a house of delegates, to consist of not less than two hundred 
members, nor more than five hundred. Tliese were also to be chosen by the people. The proprietor, 
or his deputy (the governor), was to preside, and to have a three-fold voice in the council ; that is, on 
all questions, he was to have tluree votes for every one of the councillors. ' Page 144. 



1682.] 



THE CAROLINAS. 



and after resting a few days, he proceeded to visit 
his brethren in New Jersey, and the authorities 
at New York. On his return, he met the General 
Assembly of the province at Chester,' when he 
declared the union of The Territories with Pennsyl- 
vania. He made a more judicious organization of the 
local government, and then were permanently laid the 
foundations of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. 



97 




THE ASSEMBLY HOUSE. 



CHAPTER IX 



THE CAROLINAS. [1622 — 1680.] 

Unsuccessful effort^ at settlement on the coast of Carolina, were made 
during a portion of the sixteenth century. These we have already considered.' 
As early as 1609, some dissatisfied people from Jamestown settled on the 
Nansemond; and in 1622, Porey, then Secretary of Virginia, with a few 
friends, penetrated the country beyond the Roanoke. In 1630, Charles the 
First granted to Sir Robert Heath, his attorney-general, a domam south of 
Virginia, six degrees of latitude in width, extending from Albemarle Sound to 
the St. John's River, in Florida, and, as usual, westward to the Pacific Ocean. 
No settlements were made, and the charter was forfeited. At that time. Dis- 
senters or Nonconformists' suffered many disabilities in Virginia, and looked to 
the wilderness for freedom. In 1653, Roger Green and a few Presbyterians 
left that colony and settled upon the Chowan River, near the present village of 
Edenton. Other dissenters followed, and the colony flourished. Governor 
Berkeley, of Virginia,* wisely organized them into a separate political commu- 
nity [1663], and William Drummond," a Scotch Presbyterian minister, was 
appointed their governor. They received the name of Albemarle County 
Colony^ in honor of the Duke of Albemarle, who, that year, became a proprietor 
of the territory. Two years previously [1661], some New England' adventur- 
ers settled in the vicinity of Wilmington, on the Cape Fear River, but many 
of them soon abandoned the country because of its poverty. 

Charles the Second was famous for his distribution of the lands in the New 
World, among his friends and favorites, regardless of any other claims, Abo- 



' The picture ia a correct representation of the building at Chester, in Pennsylvania, wherein 
itie Assembly met. It was yet standing in 1860. Not far from the spot, on the shore of the Dela- 
ware, at the mouth of Chester Creek, was also a solitary pine-tree, which marked the place where 
Penn landed. 

' Pages 55 to 57 inclusive. ' Note 2, page 76. * Page 78. 

* Drummond was afterward executed on account of his participation in Bacon's revolutionary 
acta. See note 5, page 112. ' Paga 108. 

7 



98 SETTLEMENTS. tl622. 

riginal or European. In 1663, he granted the whole territory named in Sir 
Robert Heath's charter, to eight of his principal friends,' and called it Caro- 
lina.^ As the ChoAvan settlement was not within the limits of the charter, the 
boundary was extended northward to the present line between Virginia and 
North Carolina, and also southward, so as to include the whole of Florida, 
except its peninsula. The Bahama Islands were granted to the same proprie- 
tors in 1667.^ Two years earlier [1665], a company of Barbadoes planters 
settled upon the lands first occupied by the New England people, near the 
present Wilmington, and founded a permanent settlement there. The few 
settlers yet remaining were treated kindly, and soon an independent colony, with 
Sir John Yeamans* as governor, was established. It was called the Clarendon 
County Colony^ in honor of one of the proprietors. Yeamans managed 
prudently, but the poverty of the soil prevented a rapid increase in the popula- 
tion. The settlers applied themselves to the manufacture of boards, shingles, 
and staves, which they shipped to the West Indies ; and that business is yet the 
staple trade of that region of pine forests and sandy levels. Although the 
settlement did not flourish, it continued to exist ; and then was founded the 
commonwealth of North Carolina. 

The special attention of the proprietors was soon turned toward the more 
southerly and fertile portion of their domain, and in January, 1670, they sent 
three ships with emigrants, under the direction of William Sayle^ and Joseph 
West, to plant a colony below Cape Fear. They entered Port Royal, landed 
on Beaufort Island at the spot where the Huguenots built Fort Carolina in 
1564," and there Sayle died early in 1671. The immigrants soon afterwai-d 
abandoned Beaufort, and sailing into the Ashley River,' seated themselves on 
its western bank, at a place a few miles above Charleston, now known as Old 
Town. There they planted the first seeds of a South Carolina colony. West 
exercised authority as chief magistrate, until the arrival of Sir John Yeamans, 
in December, 1671, who was appointed governor. He came with fifty families, 
and a large number of slaves.® Representative government was instituted in 
1672^ under the title of the Carteret County Colony. It was so called in 
honor of one of the proprietors.'" Ten years afterward they abandoned the spot ; 



' Lord Clarendon, his prime minister ; General Monk, just created Duke of Albemarle ; Lord 
Ashley Cooper, afterward Earl of Shaftesbury ; Sir George Carteret, a proprietor of New Jersey ; 
Sir William Berkeley, Governor of Virginia; Lord Berkeley, Lord Craven, and Sir John Colleton. 

^ It will be perceived [note 1, page 55] that the name of Carolina^ given to territory south of 
Virginia, was bestowed in honor of two kings named Charles, one of France, the other of England. 

^ Samuel Stephens succeeded Drummond as governor, in 1667; and in 1668, the first popular 
Assembly in North Carolina convened at Edenton. 

* Yeamans was an impoverished English baronet, who had become a planter in Barbadoes, to 
mend his fortune. He was successfial, and became wealthy. 

^ Sayle had previously explored the Carolina coast. Twenty years before, he had attempted to 
plant an "Eleutharia," or place dedicated to the genius of Liberty [see Eleutheria, Anthon's Class- 
ical Dictionary], in the isles near the coast of Florida. 

« Page 50. ' Page 166. 

® This was the commencement of negro slavery in South Carolina. Yeamans brought almost 
two hundred of tliem from Barbadoes. From the commencement, South Carolina has been a 
planting State. » Note 5, page 165. 

*" He was also one of the proprietors of New Jersey. See page 119. 



3680.J GEORGIA. 99 

and upon Oyster Point, at the junction of Ashley and Cooper Rivers,' nearer 
thQ sea, they founded the present city of Charleston." Immigrants came from 
various parts of Europe ; and many Dutch families, dissatisfied with the English 
rule at New York,^ went to South Carolina, where lands were freely given 
them ; and soon, along the Santee and the Edisto, the wilderness began to 
blossom under the hand of culture. The people would have nothing to do with 
a government scheme prepared by Shaftesbury and Locke,* but preferred simple 
organic laws of their own making. Then were laid the foundations of the com- 
monwealth of South Carolina, although the history of the two States, under 
the same proprietors, is inseparable, until the period of their dismemberment, 
in 1729.5 



CHAPTER X. 

GEORGIA. [1-733.] 

Georgia was the latest settled of the thirteen original English colonies in 
America. When the proprietors of the Carolinas surrendered their charter^ to 
the crown in 1729, the whole country southward of the Savannah River, to 
the vicinity of St. Augustine, was a wilderness peopled by native tribes,' and 
claimed by the Spaniards as part of their territory of Florida.® The English 
disputed this claim, and South Carolina townships were ordered to be marked 
out as far south as the Alatamaha. The dispute grew warm and warlike, and 
the Indians, instigated by the Spaniards, depredated upon the frontier English 
settlements.' But, while the clouds of hostility were gathering in the firma- 
.ment, and grew darker every hour, it was lighted up by a bright beam of be- 
nevolence, which proved the harbinger of a glorious day. It came from England, 
where, at that time, poverty was often considered a crime, and at least four 
thousand unfortunate debtors were yearly consigned to loathsome prisons. The 
honest and true, the noble and the educated, as well as the ignorant and the 
vile, groaned within prison walls. Their wailings at length reached the ears 
of benevolent men. Foremost among these was James Edward Oglethorpe,'" a 
brave soldier and stanch loyalist, whose voice had been heard often in Parlia- 
ment against imprisonment for debt. 

A committee of inquiry into the subject of such imprisonments, was ap- 

' These were so called in honor of Ashley Cooper, Earl of Shaftesbury. The Indian name of 
the former was Ke-a-wah, and of the latter E-ti-ioan. 

^ Charleston was laid out in 1680 by John Culpepper, who had -been surveyor-general for 
North Carolina. See page 166. ^ Page 164. * Pa^e 1«4. ^ Page 171. 

" Page 171. '' Page 29. « Page 42. « Page 170. 

'" See portrait, page 104. General Oglethorpe was bom in Surrey, England, on the 21st of De- 
cember, 1698. He was a soldier by profession. In 1745, he was made a brigadier-general, and 
fought against Charles Edward, the Pretender, who was a grandson of James the Second, and 
claimed rightful heirship to the throne of England. Oglethorpe refused the supreme command of 
■the British army destined for America m 1775. He died, June 30, 1785, aged eighty-seven yeajs. 



100 SETTLEMENTS. fl'^SS. 

pointed bj Parliament^ and General Oglethorpe was made chairman of it. Hia 
report, embodying a noble scheme of benevolence, attracted attention ^nd 
admiration. He proposed to open the prison doors to all virtuous men within, 
who would accept the conditions, and with these and other sufferers from pov- 
erty and oppression, to go to the wilderness of America, and there establish a 
colony of freemen, and open an asylum for persecuted Protestants' of all lands. 
The plan met warm responses in Parliament, and received the hearty approval 
of George the Second, then [1730] on the English throne. A royal charter for 
twenty-one years was granted [June 9, 1732] to a corporation " in trust for 
the poor," to establish a colony Avithin the disputed territory south of the Sa- 
vannah, to be called Georgia, in honor of the king.* Individuals subscribed, 
large sums to defray the expenses of emigrants hither ; and within two yeara 
after the issuing of the patent. Parliament had appropriated one hundred and 
eighty thousand dollars for the same purpose.^ 

The sagacious and brave Oglethorpe was a practical philanthropist. He 
offered to accompany the first settlers to the wilderness, and to act as governor 
of the new province. With one hundred and twenty emigrants he left England 
[Nov., 1732], and after a passage of fifty-seven days, touched at Charleston 
[Jan., 1733], where he was received with great joy by the inhabitants, as one 
who was about to plant a barrier between them and the hostile Indians and. 
Spaniards.'' Proceeding to Port Royal, Oglethorpe landed a large portion of 
his followers there, and with a few others, he coasted to the Savannah River. 
Sailing up that stream as far as Yamacraw Bluff, he landed, and chose the spot 
whereon to lay the foundation of the capital of a future State.* 

On the 12th of February, 1733, the remainder of the immigrants arrived 
from Port Royal. The winter air was genial, and with cheerful hearts and 
willing hands they constructed a rude fortification, and commenced the erection 
of a town, which they called Savannah, the Indian name of the river." For 
almost a year the governor dwelt under a tent, and there he often held friendly 
intercourse with the chiefs of neighboring tribes. At length, when he had 
mounted cannons upon the fort, and safety was thus secured, Oglethorpe met 



' Note 14, page 62. 

"^ The domain granted by the charter extended along the coast from the Savannah to the Ala- 
tamaha, and westward to the Pacific Ocean. Tlie trustees appointed by the crown, possessed all 
legislative and executive power ; and, therefore, while one side of the seal of the new province 
expressed the benevolent character of the sclieme, by the device of a group of toOing silivworms, 
and the motto, Non sibi, sed aliis ; the other side, bearing, between two urns the genius of 
" Georgia Augusta," with a cap of liberty on her head, a spear, and a horn of plenty, was a false 
emblem. There Avas no political liberty for the people. 

^ Brilliant visions of vast vintages, immense productions of silk for British looms, and all the 
wealth of a fertile tropical region, were presented for tlie contemplation of the commercial acumen 
of the business men of England. These considerations, as well as the promptings of pure benev- 
olence, made donations liberal and numerous. ■* Page 99. 

* Some liistorians believe that Sir Walter Raleigh, while on his way to South America, in 1595, 
went up the Savannah River, and held a conference witli the Indians on this very spot. This, 
probably, is an error, for nothing appears in tlie A^ritings of Raleigh or his cotemporaries to warrant 
the inference that he ever saw the North American continent. 

* The streets were laid out with great regularity; public squares were reserved; and the houses- 
were all built on one model — twenty-four by sixteen feet, on the ground. 




Oglethorpe's first Interview with the Indiak'', 



ill 



1733.] GEORGIA. 103 

fifty chiefs in council [May, 1733], with To-mo-chi-chi,^ the principal sachem 
of the lower Creek confederacy.^ at their head, to treat for the purchase of 
lands. Satisfactory arrangements were made, and the English obtained sover- 
eignty over the whole domain [June 1, 1733J along the Atlantic from the Sa- 
vannah to the St. John's, and westward to the Flint and the head Avaters of the 
Chattahoochee. The provisions of the charter formed the constitution of gov- 
ernment for the people ; and there, upon Yamacraw Bluff, where the flourishing 
city of Savannah now stands, was laid the foundation of the commonwealth of 
Georgia, in the summer of 1733. Immigration flowed thither in a strong and 
continuous stream, for all were free in religious matters ; yet for many years 
the colony did not flourish.^ 

Wonderful, indeed, were the events connected with the permanent settle- 
ments in the New World. Never in the history of the race Avas greater hero- 
ism displayed than the seaboard of the domain of the United States exhibited 
during the period of settlements, and the development of colonies. Hardihood, 
faith, courage, indomitable perseverance, and untiring energy, were requisite 
to accomplish all that was done in so short a time, and upder such unfavorable 
circumstances. While many of the early immigrants were mere adventurers, 
and sleep in deserved oblivion, because they were recreant to the great dutj 
which they had self-imposed, there are thousands whose names ought to be per- 
petuated in brass and marble, because of their faithful performance of the 
mighty task assigned them. They came here as sowers of the prolific seed of 
human liberty ; and during the colonizing period, many of them carefully nur- 
tured the tender plant, while it was bursting into vigorous life. We, who are 
the reapers, ought to reverence the sowers and the cultivators with grateful 
hearts. 

' To-mo-chi-chi was then an aged man, and at his first interview with Oglethorpe, he presented 
him with a buffalo skin, ornamented with the picture of an eagle. " Here," said the chief^ " is a little 
present : I give you a buffalo's skin, adorned on the inside with the head and feathers of an eagle, 
which I desire you to accept, because the eagle is an emblem of speed, and the buffalo of strength. 
The Enghsh are swift as the bird, and strong as the beast, since, like the former, tliey flew over 
vast seas to the uttermost parts of the earth ; and like the latter, they are so strong that nothing 
can withstand them. The feathers of an eagle are soft, and signify love ; the buflido's skin is 
warm, and signifies protection ; — therefore I hope the EngUsh will protect and love our little fam- 
ilies." Alas ! the wishes of the venerable To-mo-chi-chi were never realized, for the white people 
more often j)lundered and destroyed, than loved antl protected the Indians. 

To-mo-chi-chi died on the 5th of October, 1*739, at his own town, four miles from Savannah, 
aged about ninety-seven years. He loved General Oglethorpe, and expressed a desire that his 
body might be laid among ttie Euglisli at Savannah. It was buried tliere with public honors. — Sea 
the Gentleman's Magazine^ 1740, page 129. 

^ Page 30. ' ' Pages 171 and 173. 




JAMES EDWARD OGLETHORPE. 



FOURTH PERIOD. 
THE COLONIES, 



CHAPTER I. 

Having briefly traced the interesting 
events which resulted in the founding of sev- 
eral colonies by settlements we will now con- 
sider the more important acts of establishing permanent commonwealths, all of 
which still exist and flourish. The colonial history of the United States is 
comprised within the period commencing when the several settlements along the 
Atlantic coasts became organized into political communities, and ending when 
representatives of these colonies met in general congress in 1774,' and confeder- 
ated for mutual welfare. There was an earlier union of interests and efibrts. 
It was when the several English colonies aided the mother country in a long 
war against the combilied hostilities of the French and Indians. As the local 
histories of the several colonies after the commencement of that war have but 
little interest for the general reader, we shall trace the progress of each colony 
only to that period, and devote a chapter to the narrative of the French and 
Indian war.'' 



Pase 228. 



Page 179 



1619.J VIRGINIA. 105 

As we have already observed, a settlement acquires the character of a 
colon]) only Avhen it has become permanent, and the people, acknowledging 
allegiance to a parent State, are governed by organic laws.' According to 
these conditions, the earliest of the thirteen colonies represented in the Con- 
gress of 1774, was 

VIRGINIA. [1G19.] 

That was an auspicious day for the six hundred settlers in Virginia when 
the gold-seekers disappeared," and the enlightened George Yeardley became 
governor, and established a representative assembly [June 28, 1619]^ — the first 
in all America.^ And yet a j)rime element of happiness and prosperity Avas 
wanting. There were few white women in the colony. The wise Sandys, the 
friend of the Pilgrim Fathers ^'^ was then treasurer of the London Company,^ 
and one of the most influential and zealous promoters of emigration. During 
the same year when the Puritans sailed for America [1620], he sent more than 
twelve hundred emigrants to Virginia, among whom were ninety young women, 
"pure and uncorrupt," who were disposed of for the cost of their passage, as 
wives for the planters.* The following year sixty more were sent. The fam- 
ily relation was soon established ; the gentle influence of woman gave refine- 
ment to social life on the banks of the Powhatan ;^ new and powerful incentives 
to industry and thrift were created ; and the mated planters no longer cherished 
the prevailing idea of returning to England.^ Vessel after vessel, laden with 
immigrants, continued to arrive in the James River, and new settlements were 
planted, even so remote as at the Falls, ^ and on the distant banks of the Poto- 
mac. The germ of an empire was rapidly expanding with the active elements 
of national organization. Verbal instructions would no longer serve the pur- 
poses of government, and in July, 1621, the Company granted the colonists 
a written Constitution.,"^ which ratified most of the acts of Yeardley." Pro- 
vision was made for the appointment of a governor and council by the Company, 
and a popular Assembly, to consist of two burgesses or representatives from 
each borough, chosen by the people. This body, and the council, composed 
the General Assembly, Avhich was to meet once a year, and pass laws for the 



\ Pago Gl. - Page 71. = Page 71. " Page 77. ^ Page 64. 

'■ Tobacco had alreadj^ become a circulating medium, or currency, in Virginia. The price of a 
wife varied from 120 to 150 pounds of this product, equivalent, in money value, to about $90 and 
$112 each. The second " cargo" were sold at a still higher price. By the Iving's special order, one 
hundred dissolute vagabonds, called "jail-birds" by tlie colonists, were sent over tiie same year, and 
fiold as bond-servants for a specified time. In August, the same year, a Dutch trading vessel en- 
tered the James River witli negro slaves. Twenty of them were sold mto perpetual slavery to the 
planters. This was the commencement of negro slavery in the English colonies [note 4. page 177]. 
The slave population of the. United States in 1860, according to the census, was about 4,000,000. 

' Page 64. 

" Most of the immigrants liitherto were possessed of the spirit of mere adventurers. They camg 
to America to repair shattered fortunes, or to gain wealth, with the ultimate object of returning to 
England to enjoy it. The creation of families made the planters more attached to the soil of Vir- 
ginia. 

" Near the site of the city of Richmond. The fells, or rapids, extend about six miles. 

*" The people of the May-floiuer formed a loritten Constitution for themselves [page 78]. That 
of Virginia was modeled after the Constitution of England. i' Page 70. 



106 THE COLONIES. [1619, 

general good." Such laws were not valid until approve^ by the Company, 
neither were any orders of the Company binding upon the colonists until 
ratified by the General Assembly. Trial by jury was established, and courts 
of laAv conformable to those of England were organized. Ever afterward claim- 
ing these 2>rivile(jes as rights, the Virginians look back to the summer of 1621 
as the era of their civil freedom. 

The excellent Sir Francis Wyatt, who had been appointed governor under 
the Constitution, and brought the instrument with him, w^as delighted with the 
aspect of affairs in Virginia. But a dark cloud soon arose in the summer sky. 
The neighboring Indian tribes^ gathered in solemn council. Powhatan, the 
friend of the English after the marriage of his daughter,' was dead, and an 
enemy of the white people ruled the dusky nation.'' They had watched the 
increasing strength of the English, with alarm. The white people were now 
four thousand in number, and rapidly increasing. The Indians read their des- 
tiny-;-annihilation — upon the face of every new comer ; and, prompted by the 
first great law of his nature, self-preservation, the red man resolved to strike a 
blow for life. A conspiracy Avas accordingly formed, in the spring of 1622, to 
exterminate the white people. At mid-day, on the 1st of April, the hatchet 
fell upon all of the more remote settlements ; and within an hour, three hun- 
dred and fifty men, women, and children, were slain. ^ Jamestown*^ and neigh- 
boring plantations Avere saved by the timely warning of a converted Indian.'' 
The people were on their guard and escaped. Those far away in the forests 
defended themselves bravely, and when they had beaten back the foe, they fled 
to Jamestown. Within a few days, eighty plantations Avere reduced to eight. 

The people, thus concentrated at Jamestown by a terrible necessity, pre- 
pared for vengeance. A vindictive war ensued, and a terrible blow of retalia- 
tion Avas given. The Indians upon the James and York Rivers Avere slaughtered 
by scores, or Avere driven far back into the Avilderness. Yet a blight Avas upon 
the colony. Sickness and famine followed close upon the massacre. Within 
three months, the colony of four thousand souls Avas reduced to tAventy-five- 
hundred ; and at the beginning of 1624, of the nine thousand persons Avho had 
been sent to Virginia from England, only eighteen hundred remained. 

These disheartening events, and the selfish action of the king, discouraged 
the London Company.® The holders of the stock had now become very numer- 
ous, and their meetings, composed of men of all respectable classes, assumed a 

' This was the beginning of the Virginia House of Burgesses, of which we shall often speak in 
future eliapters ^ The Powhatans. See page 20. ^ Page 70. 

" Powhatan died in 1618, and was succeeded in office by his younger brother, Opechancan- 
ougli [see page 66]. This chief hated the English. He was the one who made Captain Smith a 
prisoner. 

* Opechancanough was wily and exceedingly treacherous. Only a few days before the mas- 
sacre, he declared that "sooner the skies would fall tlian his friendship witii tlie English would be 
dissolved." Even on tlie day of the massacre, the Indians entered the houses of the planters with 
usual tokens of friendship. ^ Page 64. 

' This was Chanco, who was informed of the bloody design the evening previous. He desired 
to save a white friend in Jamestown, and gave him tlie information. It was too late to send word 
to the more remote settlements. Among tliose who fell on this occasion, were six members of the 
fr)aiicil, and several of the wealthiest inhabitants. ' Page 64. 



1G88.] VIRGINIA. 107 

political character, in which two distinct parties were represented, namely, the 
advocates of liberty, and the supporters of the royal prerogatives. The king 
was offended by the freedom of debates at these meetings, and regarded them 
as inimical to royalty, and dangerous to the stability of his throne.' He deter- 
mined to regain what he had lost by granting the liberal third charter'' to the 
company. He endeavored first to control the elections. Failing in this, he 
sought a pretense for dissolving the Comjjany. A commission was appointed 
in May, 1623, to inquire into their affairs. It was composed of the king's 
pliant instruments, who, having reported in favor of a dissolution of the Com- 
pany, an equally pliant judiciary accomplished his designs in October following, 
and a cfiio loarrantd' was issued. The Company made but little opposition, for 
the settlement of Virginia had been an unprofitable speculation from the be- 
ginning ; and in July, 1624, the patents were cancelled.^ Virginia became a 
royal province again, ^ but no material change was made in the domestic affairs 
of the colonists. 

King James, with his usual egotism, boasted of the beneficent results to the 
colonists which .would flow from this usurpation, by which they were placed 
under his special care. He appointed Yeardley,^ with twelve councillors, to 
administer the government, but wisely refrained from interfering with the 
House of Burgesses.'' The king lived but a few months longer, and at his 
death, which occurred on the 6th of April, 1625, he was succeeded by his son, 
Charles the First. That monarch was as selfish as ho was weak. He sought 
to promote the welfiire of the Virginia planters, because he also sought to reap 
the profits of a monopoly, by becoming himself their sole factor in the manage- 
ment of their exports. He also allowed them political privileges, not because he 
wished to benefit his subjects, but because he had learned to respect the power 
of those far-off colonists ; and he sought their sanction for his commercial 
agency.** 

Governor Yeardley died in November, 1627, and was succeeded, two years 
later [1629], by Sir John Harvey, a haughty and unpopular royalist. He was 
a member of the commission appointed by James ; and the colonists so despised 
him, that they refused the coveted monopoly to the king. After many and 
violent disputes about land titles, the Virginians deposed him [1635] and 
appointed commissioners to proceed to England, with an impeachment. Harvey 
accompanied the commission. The king refused to hear complaints against the 



' These meetings were quite frequent ; and so important wf re the members, in pohtical affaire, 
that they could influence the elections of members of Parliament. In 1623, the accomplished 
Nicholas Ferrar, an active opponent of the court party, was elected to Parliament, by the influence 
of the London Company. This fact, doubtless, caused the king to dissolve the Company that year. 

"• Page 70. 

^ A writ of quo warranto is issued to compel a person or corporation to appear before the king, 
and show by what authority certain privileges are held. 

* The Company had expended almost $700,000 in establishing the colony, and this great sum 
was almost a dead loss to the stockholders. ^ Page 63. 

'■ Page 70. "> Note 1, page 106. 

* In June, 1628, the king, in a letter to the governor and council, asked them to convene an 
assembly to consider his proposal to contract for the whole crop of tobacco. He thus tacitly 
acknowledged the legality of the republican assembly of Virginia, hitherto not sanctioned, but only 
permitted. 



^08 THE COLONIES. [1619. 

accused, and he was sent back clothed with full powers to administer the gov- 
ernment, independent of the people. He ruled almost four years longer, and was 
succeeded, in November, 1639, by Sir Francis Wyatt, who administered gov- 
ernment well for about two years, when he was succeeded [1641] by Sir William 
Berkeley,' an able and elegant courtier. For ten years Berkeley ruled with 
vigor, and the colony prospered wonderfully.'^ But, as in later years, commo- 
tions in Europe now disturbed the American settlements. The democratic 
revolution in England,^ which brought Charles the First to the block, and 
placed Oliver Cromwell in power, now [1642] began, and religious sects in 
England and America assumed political importance. Puritans* had hitherto 
been tolerated in Virginia, but now the Throne and the Church were united in 
interest, and the Virginians being loyal to both, it was decreed that no minister 
should preach except in conformity to the constitution of the Church of En- 
gland.^ Many non-conformists*' were banished from the colony. This was a 
dark cloud upon the otherwise clear skies of Virginia, but a darker cloud was 
gathering. The Indians were again incited to hostilities by the restless and 
vengeful Opechancanough,' and a terrible storm burst upon the English, in 
April, 1644. For two years a bloody border warfare was carried on. The 
king of the Powhatans^ was finally made captive, and died while in prison at 
Jamestown, and his people were thoroughly subdued. The power of the con- 
federation was completely broken, and after ceding large tracts of land to the 
English, the chiefs acknowledged allegiance to the authorities of Virgmia, and 
so the political life of the Powhatans passed away forever." 

During the civil war in England [1641 — 1649], the Virginians remained 
loyal ; and when republican government was proclaimed, they boldly recognized 
the son of the late king, although in exile, as their sovereign.'" The republican 
parliament was highly incensed, and took immediate measures to coerce Vir- 
ginia into submission to its authority. For that purpose Sir George Ayscue 
was sent with a powerful fleet, bearing commissioners of parliament, as repre- 
sentatives of the sovereignty of the commonwealth, and anchored in Hampton 
Roads in March, 1651. 

" William Berkeley was bom near London ; was educated at Oxford ; became, by travel and 
education, a polished gentleman; was governor of Virginia almost 40 years, and died in July, 1677. 

* In 1648, the number of colonists was 20,000. "The cottages were filled with children, as the 
ports were with ships and immigrants." . 

^ For a long time the exactions of the king fostered a bitter feeling toward him, in the hearts 
of the people. In 1641 they took up arms against their sovereign. One of the chief leaders of the 
popular party was Oliver Cromwell. The war continued until 1649, when the royalists were sub- 
dued, and the king was beheaded. Parliament assumed all the functions of government, and ruled 
until 1653, when Cromwell, the insurgent leader, dissolved that body, and was proclaimed supremo 
ruler, with the title of Protector of the Commonwealth of England. Cromwell was a son of a 
wealthy brewer of Huntingdon, England, where he was born in 1599. He died in September, 
1658. * Page 75. * Page 75. 

* Note 2, page 76. ' Note 5, page 106. * Page 20. 

" They relinquished all claim to the beautiful country between the York and James Rivers, 
from the Falls of the latter, at Richmond, to the sea, forever. It was a legacy of a dying nation 
to their conquerors. After that, their utter destruction was swift and thorough. 

*" Afterward the profligate Charles the Second. His mother was sister to the French king, and 
to that court she fled, with her children. It was a sad day for the moral character of England 
when Charles was enthroned. He was less bigoted, but more licentious than any of the Stuarts 
who governed Great Britain for more than eighty years. 



1688.] VIRGINIA. 109 

The Virginians had resolved to submit rather than fight, yet they made a 
show of resistance. They declared their willingness to compromise with the 
invaders, to which the commissioners, surprised and intimidated by the bold 
attitude of the colonists, readily consented. Instead of opening their cannons 
upon the Virginians, they courteously proposed to them submission to the 
authority of parliament upon terms quite satisfactory to the colonists. Liberal 
political concessions to the people were secured, and they were allowed nearly 
all those civil rights which the Declaration of Independence,' a century and a 
quarter later, charged George the Third with violating. 

Virginia was, virtually, an independent State, until Charles the Second 
was restored to the throne of his father [May 29, 1660], for Cromwell made no 
appointments except that of governor. In the same year [1652] when the par- 
liamentary commissioners came, the people had elected Richard Bennet to fill 
Berkeley's place. He was succeeded by Edward Digges, and in 1656, Crom- 
well appointed Samuel Mathews governor. On the death of the Protector 
[1658], the Virginians were not disposed to acknowledge the authority of his 
son Richard,^ and they elected Mathews their chief magistrate, as a token of 
their independence. Universal suffrage prevailed ; all freemen, without excep- 
tion, were allowed to vote ; and Avhite servants, when their terms of bondage 
ended, had the same privilege, and might become burgesses. 

But a serious change came to the Virginians, after the restoration of Charles 
the Second. When intelligence of that event reached Virginia, Berkeley, 
whom the people had elected governor in 1660, repudiated the popular sover- 
eignty, and proclaimed the exiled monarch " King of England, Scotland, Ire- 
land, and F/rj/mia." This happened before he was proclaimed in England.^ 
The Virginia republicans were ofiended, but being in the minority, could do 
nothing. A new Assembly was elected and convened, and high hopes of favor 
from the monarch were entertained by the court party. But these were speed- 
ily blasted, and in place of great privileges, came commercial restrictions to 
cripple the industry of the colony. The navigation act of 1651 was re-enacted 
in 1660, and its provisions were rigorously enforced.'' The people murmured, 



' See Supplement. 

' Cromwell appointed his son Richard to sncced him in office. Lacking the vigor and ambition 
of his father, he gladly resigned the troublesome legacy into the hands of the people, and, a little 
more than a year afterward, Charles the Second was enthroned. 

' When informed that Parliament was about to send a fleet to bring them to submission, the 
Virginians sent a message to Charles, then in Flanders, inviting him to come over and be king of 
Vu-ginia. He had resolved to come, when matters took a turn in England favorable to his restora- 
tion. In gratitude to the colonists, lie caused the arms of Virginia to be quartered with those of 
England, Scotland, and Ireland, as an independent member of the empire. From this circumstance 
Virginia received the name of The Old DoTninion. Coins, with these quarterings, were made aa 
late as 1773. 

* The first Navigation Act, by the Republican Parliament, prohibited foreign vessels trading to 
the English colonies. This was partly to punish the sugar-producing islands of the West Indies, 
because the people were chiefly loyalists. The act of 1660 provided that no goods should be 
carried to or from any English colonies, but in vessels built within the English dominions, whose 
masters and at least three fourths of the crews were Englishmen ; and that sugar, tobacco, and 
other colonial commodities should be imported into no part of Europe, except England and her 
dominions. The trade between the colonies, now struggling for prosperous life, was also taxed for 
the benefit of England. 



110 THE COLONIES. , [1619. 

but in vain. The profligate monarch, who seems never to have had a clear 
perception of right and wrong, but Avas governed by caprice and passion, gave 
away, to his special favorites, large tracts of the finest portions of the Virginia 
soil, some of it already well cultivated.' 

Week after week, and month after month, the Royalist party continued to show 
more and more of the foul hand of despotism. The pliant Assembly abridged 
the liberties of the people. Although elected for only two years, the members 
assumed to themselves the right of holding ofiice indefinitely, and the repre- 
sentative system was thus virtually abolished. The doctrines and rituals of 
the Church of England having been made the religion of the State, intolerance 
began to grow. Baptists and Quakers^ were compelled to pay heavy fines. 
The salaries of the royal ofiicers being paid from duties upon exported tobacco, 
these ofiicials were made independent of the people.' Oppressive and unequal 
taxes were levied, and the idle aristocracy formed a distinct and ruling class. 
The "common people" — the men of toil and substantial worth — formed a 
republican party, and rebellious murmurs were heard on every side. They 
desired a sufficient reason for strengthening their power, and it soon appeared. 
The menaces of the Susquehannah Indians,* a fierce tribe of Lower Pennsylva- 
nia, gave the people a plausible pretense for arming during the summer of 
1675. The Indians had been driven from their hunting-grounds at the head 
of the Chesapeake Bay by the Senecas,^ and coming down the Potomac, they 
made war upon the Maryland settlements.^ They finally committed murders 
upon Virginia soil, and retaliation' caused the breaking out of a fierce border 
war. The inhabitants, exasperated and alarmed, called loudly upon Governor 
Berkeley to take immediate and energetic measures for the defense of the col- 
ony. His slow and indecisive movements were very unsatisfactory, and loud 
murmurs were heard on every side. At length Nathaniel Bacon,.* an energetic 
and highly esteemed republican, acting in behalf of his party, demanded per- 
mission for the people to arm and protect themselves.^ Berkeley's sagacity 
perceived the danger of allowing discontented men to have arms, and he refused. 
The Indians came nearer and nearer, until laborers on Bacon's plantation, near 
Richmond, were murdered. That leader then yielded to the popular will, and 
placed himself at the head of four or five hundred men, to drive back the 
enemy. Berkeley, jealous of Bacon's popularity, proclaimed him a traitor 

' In 1673, the king gave to Lord Culpepper and the Earl of Arlington, two of his profligate 
favorites, "all the dominion of land and water called Virginia," for the term of thirty years. 

* Note 7, page 94. 

' One of the charges made against the King of England in the Declaration of Independence, 
more than a hundred years later, was that he had "made judges dependent on his will alone for 
the tenure of their offices and the amount and payment of their salaries." * Page 17. 

" Page 23. ^ Page 82. 

' John Washington, an ancestor of the commander-in-chief of the American armies a century 
later, commanded some troops against an Indian fort on the Potomac. Some chiefs, who were 
sent to his camp to treat for peace, were treacherously slain, and this excited the fierce resentment 
of the Susquehanuahs. 

"* He was born in England, was educated a lawyer, and in Virginia was a member of the coun- 
cil. He was about thirty years of age at that time. 

° King Philip's war was then raging in Massachusetts, and the white people, everywhere, were 
alarmed. See page 124. 



1688.] VIRGINIA. HI 

[May, 1676 J, and sent troops to arrest him. Some of his more timid followers 
returned, but sterner patriots adhered to his fortunes. The people generally 
sympathized with him, and in the lower counties they arose in open rebellion. 
Berkeley Avas obliged to recall his troops to suppress the insurrection, and in 
the mean while Bacon drove the Indians' back toward the Rappahannock. He 
was soon after elected a burgess,'' but on approaching Jamestown, to take his 
seat in the Assembly, he was arrested. For fear of the people, who made hos- 
tile demonstrations, the governor soon pardoned him and all his followers, and 
liypocritically professed a personal regard for the bold republican leader. 

Popular opinion had now manifestly become a power in Virginia ; and the 
pressure of that opinion compelled Berkeley to yield at all points. The long 
aristocratic Assembly was dissolved ; many abuses were corrected, and all the 
privileges formerly enjoyed by the people were restored.^ Fearing treachery 
in the capital. Bacon withdrew to the Middle Plantation,* where he was joined^ 
by three or four hundred armed men from the upper counties, and was pro- 
claimed commander-in-chief of the Virginia troops. The governor regarded the 
movement as rebellious, and refused to sign Bacon's commission. The patriot 
marched to Jamestown, and demanded it without delay. The frightened governor 
speedily complied [July 4, 1676], and, concealing his anger, he also, on compul- 
sion, signed a letter to the king, highly commending the acts and motives of the 
" traitor." This was exactly one hundred years, to a day, before the English 
•colonies in America declared themselves free and independent, the logic of 
which the King of Great Britain was compelled, reluctantly, to acknowledge, a 
few years later. The Virginia Assembly was as pliant before the successful 
leader as the governor, and gave him the commission of a general of a thousand 
men. On receiving it. Bacon marched against the Pamunkey Indians.^ When 
he had gone, Berkeley, faithless to his professions, crossed the York River, and 
at Gloucester summoned a convention of royalists. All the proceedings of the 
Republican Assembly were reversed, and, contrary to the advice of his friends, 
the governor again proclaimed Bacon a traitor, on the 29th of July. The 
indignation of the patriot leader was fiercely kindled, and, marching back to 
Jamestown, he lighted up a civil war. The property of royalists was confis- 
cated, their wives were seized as hostages, and their plantations were desolated. 
Berkeley fled to the eastern shore of the Chesapeake. Bacon proclaimed his 
abdication, and, dismissing the republican troops, called an Assembly in his 
own name, and was about to cast off all allegiance to the English Crown, when 



* Page 40. 

" The chief leaders of the republican party at the capital, -were "William Drummond, who had 
been governor of North Carolina [page 97], and Colonel Richard Lawrence. 

' This event was the planting of one of the roost vigorous and fruitful germs of American 
aatioiiality. It was the first bending of power to the boldly-expressed will of the people. 

' Williamsburg, four miles from Jamestown, and midway between the York and James Rivers, 
was then called the Middle Plantation. After the accession of WiUiam and Mary [seepage 113], 
a town was laid out in the form of the ciphers WM., and was named "Williamsburg. Governor 
Nichoisoa made it the capital of the province in 1G98. 

^ This was a small tribe on the Pamimkey River, one of the chief tributaries of the Yoii; 
liiver. 




;112 THE COLONIES. [1619. 

intelligence was received of the arrival of imperial troops to quell the rebellion.' 
Great was the joj of the governor, when informed of the arrival of the hoped- 
for succor, for his danger was imminent. With some royalists and English 
sailors under Major Robert Beverlej, he now [Sept. 7] returned to Jamest<)wn. 
Bacon collected hastily his troops, and drove the governor and his friends down 
the James River. Informed that a large body of royalists and imperial troops 
were approaching, the republicans, unable to maintain their position at James- 
town, applied the torch [Sept. 30] just as the night shadows came over the 
village.^ When the sun arose on the following morning, 
^ ' the first town built by Englishmen in America,* was a 

heap of smoking ruins. Nothing remained standing 
but a few chimneys, and that old church tower, which 
now attracts the eye and heart of the voyager upon the 
bosom of the James River. This work accomplished. 
Bacon pressed forward with his little army toward the 
York, determined to drive the royalists from Virginia. 
ciiLKcu TOWER. ^^^ ^^^ "^'^^ smittcn by a deadlier foe than armed men. 

The malaria of the marshes at Jamestown had poisoned 
his veins, and he died [Oct. 11, 1676] of malignant fever, on the north bank 
of the York. There was no man to receive the mantle of his ability and influ- 
ence, and his departure was a death-blow to the cause he had espoused. His 
friends and followers made but feeble resistance, and before the first of Novem- 
ber, Berkeley returned to the Middle Plantation^ in triumph. 

The dangers and vexations to Avhich the governor had been exposed during 
these commotions, rendered the haughty temper of the baron irascible, and he 
signalized his restoration to power by acts of wanton cruelty. Twenty-two of 
the insurgent leaders had been hanged,^ when the more merciful Assembly im- 
plored him to shed no more blood. But he continued fines, imprisonments, and 
confiscations, and ruled with an iron hand and a stony heart until recalled by 
the king in April, 1677, who had become disgusted Avith his cruel conduct.^ 
There was no printing press in Virginia to record current history,' and for a 

* This was an error. The fleet sent with troops to quell the insurrection, did not arrive until 
April the following year, when all was over. Colonel Jeflreys, the successor of Berkeley, came 
with the fleet. 

' Besides the church and court-house, Jamestown contained sixteen or eighteen houses, built 
of brick, and quite commodious, and a large number of humble log cabins. 

^ The church, of which the brick tower alone remains, was built about 1620. It was probably 
the third church erected in Jamestown. The ruin is now [188o] a few rods from the encroaching 
bank of the river, and is about thirty feet in height. The engraving is a correct representation of 
its present appearance. In the grave-yard adjoining are fragments of several monuments. 

* Note 4, page 111. 

* The first man executed was Colonel Hansford, He has been justly termed the first martyr in 
the cause of liberty in America. Drummond and Lawrence were also executed. They were con- 
sidered ringleaders and the prime instigators of the rebellion. 

" Charles said, "The old fool has taken more lives in that naked country than I have taken for 
the murder of my father." 

' Berkeley was an enemy to popular enlightenment. He said to commissioners sent fi'om En- 
gland in 1671, "Thank God there are no fi-ee schools nor imnting press; and I hope we shall not 
have thesp hundred years ; for learning has brought disobedience, and heresy, and sects into the 
world, and printing ha-s divulged these, and libels against the best government." Despots are 
always afraid of the printing press, for it is the most destructive foe of tyranny. 



1688.] VIRGINIA. Hg 

hundred years the narratives of the rojalists gave hue to the whole affair. 
Bacon was always regarded as a traitor^ and the effort to establish a free gov- 
ernment is known in history as Bacon's Rebellion. Such, also, would have 
been the verdict of history, had Washington and his compatriots been unsuc- 
cessful. Too often success is accounted a virtue, hnt failure, a crime. 

Long years elapsed before the effects of these civil commotions were effaced. 
The people were borne down by the petty tyranny of royal rulers, yet the prin- 
ciples of Republicanism grew apace. The popular Assembly became winnowed 
of its aristocratic elements ; and, notwithstanding royal troops were quar- 
tered in Virginia,' to overawe the people, the burgesses were always firm in the 
maintenance of popular rights.'' In reply to Governor Jeffreys, when he ap- 
pealed to the authority of the Great Seal of England, in defense of his arbitrary 
act in seizing the books and papers of the Assembly, the burgesses said, " that 
such a breash of privilege could not be commanded under the Great Seal, be- 
cause they could not find that any king of England had ever done so in former 
times." The king commanded the governor to " signify his majesty's indigna- 
tion at language so seditious;" but the burgesses were as indifferent to royal 
frowns as they were to the governor's menaces. 

A libertine from the purlieus of the licentious court now came to rule the 
liberty-loving Virginians. It was Lord Culpepper, who, under the grant of 
1673,3 had been appointed governor for life in 1677. He arrived in 1680. His 
profligacy and rapacity disgusted the people. Discontents ripened into insur- 
rections, and the blood of patriots again flowed." At length the king himself 
became incensed against Culpepper, revoked his grant' in 1684, and deprived 
him of office. Effingham, his successor, was equally rapacious, and the people 
were on the eve of a general rebellion, when king Charles died, and his brother 
James^ was proclaimed [Feb. 1685] his successor, with the title of James the 
Second. The people hoped for benefit by the change of rulers, but their bur- 
dens were increased. Again the wave of rebellion was rising high, when the 
revolution of 1688 placed AYilliam of Orange and his wife Mary upon the 
throne.'' Then a real change for the better took place. The detested and 
detestable Stuarts were forever driven from the seat of power in Great Britain. 
That event, wrought out by the people, infused a conservative principle into- 
the workings of the English constitution. The popular will, expressed by Par- 

' These troops were under the command of a wise veteran, Sir Henry Chicheley, wlio managed 
with prudence. They proved a source of much discontent, because their subsistence was drawn 
from the planters For the same cause, disturbances occurred in New York ninetv vears afterward. 
See page 218. ' Page 71. ^ Note"^l, page 110. 

* By the king's order, Culpepper caused several of the insurgents, who were men of influence,. 
to be hanged, and a "reign of terror," miscalled tranquiUiiy, followed. 

* Arlington [note 1, page 110] had already disposed of his interest in the grant to Culpepper. 

* James, Duke of York, to whom Charles gave the New Netherlands in 1664. See page 144. 

' James the Second, by his bigotry (he was a Roman Catholic), tyranny, and oppression, ren- 
dered himself hateful to his subjects. William, Prince of Orange, Stadtholder of Holland, who had 
married Mary, a Protestant daughter of James, and his eldest child, was invited by the incensed 
people to come to the English throne. He came with Dutch troops, and landed at Torbay on the 
5th of November, 1688. James was deserted by his soldiers, and he and his family sought safety 
in flight. Wilhara and Mary were proclaimed joint monarchs of England on the 13th of February,. 
1689. This act consummated that revolution which Voltaire styled " the era of English liberty." 

8 



114 THE COLONIES. [1620. 

liament, became potential ; and the personal character, or caprices of the mon- 
arch, had comparatively little influence upon legislation. The potency of the 
National Assembly was extended to similar colonial organizations. The powers 
of governors were defined, and the rights of the people were understood. Bad 
men often exercised authority in the colonies, but it was in subordination to the 
English Constitution ; and, notwithstanding commercial restrictions bore heav- 
ily upon the enterprise of the colonies, the diffusion of just political ideas, and 
the growth of free institutions in America, were rapid and healthful. 

From the revolution of 1688, down to the commencement of the French and 
Indian Avar, the history of Virginia is the history of the steady, quiet prog- 
ress of an industrious people, and presents no prominent events of interest to 
the general reader.* 



CHAPTER II. 

MASSACHUSETTS. [1620.] 

"Welcome, Englishmen !• welcome, Englishmen!" were the first words 
which the Pilgrim Fathers^ heard from the lips of a son of the American 
forest. It was the voice of Samoset, a Wampanoag chief, who had learned a 
few English words of fishermen at Penobscot. His brethren had hovered 
around the little community of sufferers at New Plymouth^ for a hundred days, 
when he boldly approached [March 26, 1621 J, and gave the friendly saluta- 
tion. He told them to possess the land, for the occupants had nearly all been 
swept away by a pestilence. The Pilgrims thanked God for thus making their 
seat more secure, for they feared the hostility of the Aborigines. When Sam- 
oset again appeared, he was accompanied by Squanto,* a chief who had recently 
returned from captivity in Spain ; and they told the white people about Mas- 
sasoit, the grand sachem of the Wampanoags, then residing at jSIount Hope. 
An interview was planned. The old sachem came with barbaric pomp,^ and he 
and Governor Carver" smoked the calumet' together. A preliminary treaty of 
friendship and alliance was formed [April 1, 1621], which remained unbroken 



' The population at that time was about 50,000, of whom one half were slaves. The tobacco 
trade had become very important, the exports to England and Ireland being about 30,000 hogs- 
heads that year. Almost a nundred vessels annually came from those countries to Virginia for 
tobacco. A powerful militia of almost 9,000 men was organized, and they no longer feared their 
dusky neighbors. The militia became expert in the use of tire-arms in the woods, and back to this 
period the Virginia rifleman may look for the foundation of his feme as a marksman. The province 
contained twenty-two counties, and forty-eight parishes, with a church and a clergyman in each, 
and a great deal of glebe land. But there was no printing press nor book-store in the colony. A 
press was first established in Virginia in 172a. 

^ Page 77. ' Page 78. « Page 74. 

* Massasoit approached, with a guard of sixty warriors, and took post upon a neighboring hOL 
Tlierfe he sat in state, and received Edward Winslow as embassador from the English. Leaving 
Winslow with his warriors as security for his own safety, the sachem went into New Plj-mouth and 
treated with Governor Carver. Note 5, page 14. ® Page 78. ' Page 14. 



1755.] MASSACHUSETTS. 115 

for fifty years.* Massasoit rejoiced at his good fortune, for Canonicus, the head 
of the powerful Narragansetts,"* was his enemy, and he needed strength. 

Three days after the interview with the Wampanoag sachem [April 3], 
Governor Carver suddenly died. Wilham Bradford," the earliest historian of 
the colony, was appointed his successor. He was a wise and prudent man, and 
for thirty years he managed the public afiairs of the colony with great sagacity. 
He was a man just fitted for such a station, and he fostered the colony with 
parental care. The settlers endured great trials during the first four years of 
their sojourn. They were barely saved from starvation in the autumn of 1621, 
by a scanty crop of Indian corn.^ In November of that year, thirty-five im- 
migrants (some of them their weak brethren of the Speediveliy joined them, and 
increased their destitution. The winter was severe, and produced great suffer- 
ing ; and the colonists were kept in continual fear by the menaces of Canonicus, 
the great chief of the Narragansetts, who regarded the English as intruders. 
Bradford acted wisely with the chief, and soon made him sue for peace.® The 
power, but not the hatred, of the wily Indian Avas subdued, yet he was com- 
j)elled to be a passive friend of the English. 

Sixty-three more immigrants arrived at Plymouth in July, 1622. They 
)had been sent by Weston, a wealthy, dissatisfied member of the Plymouth Com- 
pany,' to plant a new colony. Many of them were idle and dissolute ;' and 
after living upon the slender means of the Plymouth people for several weeks, 
they went to Wissagusset (now Weymouth), to commence a settlement. Their 
improvidence produced a famine ; and they exasperated the Indians by begging 
and stealing supplies for their wants. A plot was devised by the savages for 
their destruction, but through the agency of Massasoit,^ it was revealed [March, 
1623] to the Plymouth people ; and Captain Miles Standish, with eight men, 
hastened to Wissagusset in time to avert the blow. A chief and several war- 
riors Avere killed in a battle ;'" and so terrified were the surrounding tribes by 



» Page 124. "" Page 22. 

' William Bradford was born at Ansterfield, in the north of England, in 1588. He followed 
Robinson to Holland ; came to America in the Mayfloiver [see page 77] ; and was annually elected 
^govertior of the colony from 1621 until his death in 1657. 

' "While Captain Miles Standish and otliers were seeking a place to land [see page 78], they 
found some maize, or Indian corn, in one of the deserted huts of the savages. Afterward, Samoset 
.and others taught them how to cultivate the gram (then unknown in Europe), and this supply serv- 
ing for seed, providentially saved them from starvation. The grain now first received the name of 
Indian corn. Early in September [1621], an exploring party, under Standish, coasted northward to 
•Shawmut, the site "of Boston, where they found a few Indians. The place was deUghtful, and for a 
while, the Pilgrims thought of removing thither. ^ Page 77. 

^ Canonicus dwelt upon Connanicut Island, opposite Newport. In token of his contempt and 
defiance of the Enghsh, he sent [Feb., 1622] a bundle of arrows, wrapped in a rattlesnake's skin, 
to Governor Bradford. The governor accepted the hostile challenge, and then returned the skin, 
filled with powder and shot. These substances were new to the savages. They regarded them 
with superstitious awe, as possessing some evil influence. They were sent from village to village, 
and excited general alarm. The pride of Canonicus was humbled, and he sued for peace. The 
example of Canonicus was followed by several chiefs, who were equally alarmed. ' l?age 63. 

" There was quite a number of indentured servants, and men of no character ; a population 
wholly unfit to found an independent State. 

° In gratitude for attentions and medicine during a severe illness, ifassasoit revealed the plot to 
Edward Winslow a few da3'S before the time appointed to strike the blow. 

" Standish carried the chiefs head m triumph to Plymouth. It was borne upon a pole, and was 
placed upon the palissades [note 1, page 127] of the little fort which had just been erected. The 



116 THE COLONIES. [162a 

the event, that several chiefs soon appeared at Plymouth to crave the friendship 
of the English. The settlement at Wissagusset was broken up, however, and 
most of the immigrants returned to England. 

Social perils soon menaced the stability of the colony. The partnership of 
merchants and colonists' was an unprofitable speculation for all. The commu- 
nity system^ operated unfavorably upon the industry and thrift of the colony, 
and the merchants had few or no returns for their investments. Ill feelings, 
were created by mutual criminations, and the capitalists commenced a series of 
annoyances to force the workers into a dissolution of the league.^ The partner- 
ship continued, however, during the prescribed term of seven years, and then 
[1627] the colonists purchased the interest of the London merchants for nine 
thousand dollars. Becoming sole proprietors of the soil, they divided the whole 
property equally, and to each man was assigned twenty acres of land in fee. 
New incentives to industry followed, and the blessings of plenty, even upon 
that unfruitful soil, rewarded them all.^ At about the same time, the govern- 
ment of the colony became slightly changed. The only officers, at first, were 
a governor and an assistant. In 1624, five assistants were chosen ; and in 
1630, a deputy-governor and eigliteen assistants were chosen by the freemen. 
This broad democracy prevailed, both in Church and State, for almost fifteen 
years, when a representative government was instituted [1639], and a pastor 
w^as chosen as spiritual guide." 

James the First died in the spring of 1625 ; and his son and successor, 
Charles the First, inherited his fiither's hatred of the Nonconformists. « Many 
of their ministers were silenced during the first years of his reign, and the un- 
easiness of the great body of Nonconformists daily increased. Already, White, 
a Puritan minister of Dorchester, in the west of England, had persuaded sev- 
eral influential men of that city to attempt the establishment of a new asylum 
for the oppressed, in America. They chose the rocky promontory of Cape 
Anne for the purpose [1624], intending to connect the settlement with the fish- 
ing business ; but the enterprise proved to be more expensive than profitable, 

.good Robinson [page 77], when he heard of it, wrote, " Oh, how happy a thing it would have beeiv 
"that you had converted some before you killed any." 

* Page 77. " Note 1, page 70. 

^ The merchants refused Mr. Robinson a passage to America ; attempted to force a minister 
upon the colonists who was friendly to the Estabhshed Church ; and even sent vessels to interfere 
with the infant commerce of tlie settlers. 

* The colonists unsuccessfully tried the cultivation of tobacco. They raised enough grain and 
vegetables for their own consumption, and relied upon traffic in furs with the Indians, for obtaining 
the means of paying for cloths, implements, etc., procured from England. In 1627, they made the 
first step toward the establishment of the cod fisherj^, since become so important, by constructing a 
salt work, and curing some fish. In 1624, Edward "V7inslow imported three cows and a bull, and 
soon those invaluable animals became numerous in the colony. 

^ The colonists considered Robinson (who was yet in Leyden), as their pastor ; and rehgious 
exercises, in the way of prayer and exhortation, were conducted by Elder Brewster and others. 
On Sunday afternoons a question would be propounded, to which all had a right to speak. Evea 
after they adopted the plan of having a pastor, the people were so democratic in religious matters, 
that a minister did not remain long at Plymouth. The doctrine of " private judgment" was put ia 
full practice ; and the religious meetings were often the arena of intemperate debate and confusion. 
In 1629, thirty-five persons, the remainder of Robinson's congregation at Leyden, joined the Pil- 
grims at Plymouth, among whom was Robinson's family ; but the good man never saw New En- 
gland himself. * Note 2, page 76. 



1755.] 



MASSACHUSETTS. 



117 



and it was abandoned. A few years afterward, a company purchased a tract 
of land [March 29, 1628] defined as being " three miles north of any and every 
part of the Merrimac River," and "three miles south of 
any and every part of the Charles River," and westward to 
the Pacific Ocean.' In the summer of 1628, John Endi- 
cot, and a hundred emigrants came over, and at Naumkeag 
(now Salem) they laid the foundations of the Colony of 
Massachusetts Bay. The proprietors received a charter from 
the king the following year [March 14, 1629], and they 
•were incorporated by the name of "■ The Governor and Com- 
pany of the Massachusetts Bay in New England^ 

The colony at Salem increased rapidly, and soon began to spread. In July, 
1629. " three godly ministers" (Skelton, Higginson, and Bright) came with 




FIRST COLONY SEAL. 




two hundred settlers, and a part of them laid the foundations of Charlestown, at 
Mishawam. A new stimulus was now given to emigration by salutary arrange- 



' This was purchased from the Council of Pl^vmouth. The chief men of the company were 
John Humphrey (brother-in-law to the earl of Lincoln), John Endicot, Sir Henry Roswell, Sir John 
Young, Thomas Southcote, Simon Whitcomb, John Winthrop, Thomas Dudley, Sir Richard Salton- 
stall, and others. Eminent men in New England afterward became interested in the enterprise. 

* The administration of affairs was intrusted to a governor, deputy, and eighteen assistants, who 
were to be elected annually by the stockholders of the corporation. A general assembly of the 
freemen of the colony was to be held at least four times a year, to legislate for the colony. The 
king claimed no jurisdiction, for he regarded the whole matter as a trading operation, not as the 
founding of an empire. The instrument conferred on the colonists all the rights of English subjects, 
*nd afterward became the text for many powerful discourses against the usurpation of royalty. 



118 THE COLONIES. [1620.. 

ments. On the 1st of September, the members of the company, at a meeting in 
Cambridge, England, signed an agreement to transfer the charter and govern- 
ment to the colonists. It was a wise and benevolent conclusion, for men of for- 
tune and intelligence immediately prepared to emigrate when such a democracy 
should be established. John Winthrop* and others, with about three hundred 
families, arrived at Salem in July [1630] following. Winthrop had been 
chosen governor before his departure, with Thomas Dudley for deputy, and a 
council of eighteen. The new immigrants located at, and named Dorchester, 
Roxbury, Watertown, and Cambridge ; and during the summer, the governor 
and some of the leading men, hearing of a spring of excellent water on the pen- 
insula of Shawmut, went there, erected a few cottages, and founded Boston, 
the future metropolis of New England.'^ The peninsula was composed of three 
hills, and for a long time it was called Tri-Mountain.' 

As usual, the ravens of sickness and death followed these first settlers. 
Many of them, accustomed to ease and luxury in England, suffered much, and 
before December, two hundred were in their graves.^ Yet the survivors Avere 
not disheartened, and during the winter of intense suffering which followed, 
they applied themselves diligently to the business of founding a State. In 
May, 1631, it was agreed at a general assembly of the people, that all the 
officers of government should thereafter be chosen by the freemen^ of the colony ; 
and in 1634, the pure democracy w^as changed to a representative government, 
the second in America.* The colony flourished. Chiefs from the Indian tribes 
dined at Governor Winthrop' s table, and made covenants of peace and friend- 
ship with the English. Winthrop journeyed on foot to exchange courtesies with 
Bradford at Plymouth,'' a friendly salutation came from the Dutch in New 
Netherland," and a ship from Virginia, laden with corn [May, 1632]. sailed 
into Boston harbor. A bright future was dawning. 

The character of the Puritans^ who founded the colony of Massachusetts- 
Bay, presents a strange problem to the scrutiny of the moral philosopher. Vic- 
tims of intolerance, they were themselves equally intolerant when clothed with 
power.'" Their ideas of civil and religious freedom were narrow, and their prac- 



' He was bom in England in 1558, and was one of the most active men in New England from 
1630 until his death in 1649. His journal, giving an interesting account of the colony, has been. 
pubhshed. 

"^ The whole company under Winthrop intended to join the settlers at Charlestown, but a pre- 
vailing sickness there, attributed to unwholesome water, caused them to locate elsewjiere. The 
fine spring of water wMch gushed from one of the tliree hills of Shawmut, was regarded with great 
favor. ' From this is derived the word Tremont. 

* Among these was Higginson, Isaac Johnston (a principal leader in the enterprise, and the 
wealthiest of the founders of Boston), and his wife the "Lady Arabella," a daughter of the earl of 
Lincoln. She died at Salem, and her husband did not long survive her. 

* None were considered freemen unless they were members of some church within the 
colony. From the beginning, the closest intimacy existed between the Church and State in Massa- 
chusetts, and that intimacy gave rise to a great many disorders. This provision was repealed in 
1665. ^ Page 71. ' Page 115. * Page 72. ^ Page 75. 

'" Sir Richard Saltonstall, who did not remain long in America, severely rebuked the people of 
Massachusetts, in a letter to the two Boston ministers, Wilson and Cotton. " It doth a little grieve 
my spirit," he said, "to hear what sad things are reported daily of your tyranny and persecutions 
m New England, as that you fine, whip, and imprison men for their consciences." Thirty yeara 
later [1665], the king's conimissioner at Picataqua, in a manuscript letter before me, addressed to 



1755.] MASSACHUSETTS. 119 

tical interpretation of the Golden Rule, was contrary to the intentions of Him 
who uttered it. Yet they were honest and true men ; and out of their love of 
freedom, and jealousy of their inherent rights, grew their intolerance. They 
regarded Churchmen and Roman Catholics as their deadly enemies, to be kept 
at a distance.' A wise caution dictated this course. A consideration of the 
prevailing spirit of the age, when bigotry assumed the seat of justice, and super- 
stition was the counselor and guide of leading men, -should cause us to 

" Be to their faults a little blind, 
And to their virtues, very kind." 

Roger Williams, himself a Puritan minister, and victim of persecution in 
England, was among those who first felt the power of Puritan intolerance. He 
was chosen minister at Salem, in 1634, and his more enlightened views, freely 
expressed, soon aroused the civil authorities against him. He denied the right 
of civil magistrates to control the consciences of the people, or to withhold their 
protection from any religious sect whatever. He denied the right of the king 
to require an oath of allegiance from the colonists ; and even contended that 
obedience to magistrates ought not to be enforced. He denounced the charter 
from the king as invalid, because he had given to the white people the lands of 
other owners, the Indians.* These doctrines, and others more theological, ' he 
maintained with vehemence, and soon the colony became a scene of great com- 
motion on that account. He was remonstrated with by the elders, warned by 
the magistrates, and finally, refusing to cease what was deemed seditious 
preaching, he was banished [November, 1635] from the colony. In the dead 
of winter he departed [January, 1636] for the wilderness, and became the 
founder of Rhode Island." 

Political events in England caused men who loved quiet to turn their 
thoughts more and more toward the New World; and the year 1635 was 
remarkable for an immense immigration to New England. During that year 
full three thousand new settlers came, among Avhom Avere men of wealth and 
influence. The most distinguished were Hugh Peters* (an eloquent preacher), 



the magistrates of Massachusetts, say, " It is possible that the charter which you so much idoliza 
may be forfeited until you have cleared yourselves of those many injustices, oppressions, violences, 
and blood for which you are complained against." 

' Lyford, who was sent out to the Pilgrims, by the London partners, as their minister, was re- 
fused and expelled, because he was friendly to the Church of England. John and Samuel Browne, 
residents at Salem, and members of Endicot's council, were arrested by that ruler, and sent to En- 
gland as " factious and evil-conditioned persons," because they insisted upon the use of the Liturgy, 
or printed forms of the English Church, in their wot-ship. 

" See page 22. This was not strictly true, for, until King Pliilip's war [page 124], in 1675, not 
a foot of ground wag occupied by the New England colonists, on any other score but that of fair 
purchase. 

* He maintained that an oath should not be tendered to an unconverted person, and that no 
Christian could lawfully pray with such an one, though it were a wife or child ! In the intem- 
perance of his zeal, Williams often exhibited intolerance himself, and at this day would be called a 
bigot. Yet his tolerant teachings in general had a most salutary effect upon Puritan exclusiveness. 

' Page 89. 

^ Peters afterward returned to England, was very active in public affairs during the civil war, 
and on the accession of Cliarles the Second, was found guilty of favoring the death of the king's 
father, and was executed in October, 1660, 



120 THE COLONIES. 

and Henry Vane, an enthusiastic young man of twenty-five. In 1636, Vane 
was elected governor, an event whicli indirectly proved disastrous to the peace 
of the colony. The banishment of Roger Williams had awakened bitter relig- 
ous dissensions, and the minds of the people Avere prepared to listen to any 
new teacher. As at Plymouth, so in the Massachusetts Bay colony, religious 
questions were debated at the stated meetings.^ Women were not allowed to 
engage in these debates, and some deemed this an abridgment of their rights. 
Among tliese was Anne Hutchinson, an able and eloquent woman, who estab- 
lished meetings at her own house, for her sex, and there she promulgated 
peculiar views, which some of the magistrates and ministers pronounced sedi- 
tious and heretical,^ These views were embraced by Governor Vane, several 
magistrates, and a majority of the leading men of Boston.^ Winthrop and 
others opposed them, and in the midst of great excitement, a synod was» 
called, the doctrines of Mrs. Hutchinson were condemned, and she and her 
family were first imprisoned in Boston, and then banished [August, 1637] 
from the colony.' Vane lost his popularity, and failing to be elected the fol- 
lowing year, he returned to England.^ Some of Mrs. Hutchinson's followers 
left the colony, and established settlements in Rhode Island.' 

The great abatement of danger to be apprehended from the Indians, caused 
by the result of the Pequod war,' was favorable to the security of the colony, 
and it flourished amazingly. Persecution also gave it sustenance. The non- 
conformists in the mother country sufiered more and more, and hundreds fled to 
New England. The church and the government became alarmed at the rapid 
growth of a colony, so opposed, in its feelings and laws, to the character of 
both. Efforts were put forth to stay the tide of emigration. As early as 1633, 
a proclamation for that purpose had been published, but not enforced ; and a 
fleet of eight vessels, bearing some of the purest patriots of the realm, was 
detained in the Thames [Feb. 1634], by order of the privy council.* Believing 
that the colonists "aimed not at new discipline, but at sovereignty," a demand 
was made for a surrender of the patent to the king.* The people were silent, 

^ Note 5, page 116. 

" She taught that, as the Holy Spirit dwells in every believer, its revelations are superior to the 
teachings of men. It was the doctrine of " private judgment" in its fullest extent. She taught that 
every person had the right to judge of the soundness of a minister's teaching, and this was consid- 
ered " rebellion against the clergy." She taught the doctrine of Ekdion, and aVerred that the elect 
saints were sure of their salvation, however vicious their lives might be. 

^ Her brother, Rev. John "Wheelwright, was an eloquent expounder of her views. The theo- 
logical question assumed a political phase, and for a long time influenced the public affairs of the 
colony. 

* Mrs. Hutchinson and her family took refuge within the Dutch domain, near the present village 
of New Rochelle, in New York. There she and all her family, except a daughter, were murdered 
by the Indians. Note 2, page 141. 

* Yane was a son/ of the Secretary of State of Charles the First. He was a republican during 
the civil war [note 3, page 108], and for this, Charles the Second had him beheaded in June, 1662. 

* Page 91. ' Page 87. 

* [Note 1, page 400.] It was asserted, and is believed, that Oliver Cromwell and John Hamp- 
den were among the passengers. There is no positive evidence that such was the fact. 

* The general patent for New England was surrendered by the Council of Plymouth, in June, 
1635, without consulting the colonists. The inflexible courage of the latter prevented the evil that 
might have ensued by this faithless act of a company which had made extensive grants; and they 
firmly held the charter given to them by the king. 



1755.] MASSACHUSETTS. 121 

but firm. When a rumor reached them [September 18, 1634] that an arbitrary 
commission/ and a general governor was appointed for all the English colonies 
in America, the Massachusetts people, poor as they were, raised three thousand 
dollars to build fortifications for resistance. Even a quo warranto [April, 
1638]^ did not afiect either their resolution or their condition. Strong in their 
integrity, they continued to strengthen their new State by fostering education,' 
the " cheap defense of nations," and by other wise appliances of vigorous efibrts. 
The civil war^ which speedily involved the church and the throne in disaster, 
withdrew the attention of the persecutors from the persecuted. The hope of 
better times at home checked immigration, and thereafter the colony received 
but small accessions to its population, from the mother country. 

The ties of interest and warmest sympathy united the struggling colonists 
of New England. Natives of the same country, the ofispring of persecution — 
alike exposed to the weapons of hostile Indians and the depredations of the 
Dutch and French,' and alike menaced with punishment by the parent govern- 
ment — they were as one people. They were now [1643] more than twenty 
thousand in number, and fifty villages had been planted by them. The civil 
war in England" threatened a total subversion of the government, and the Puri- 
tans began to reflect on the establishment of an independent nation eastward of 
the Dutch dominions.'' With this view, a union of the New England colonies was 
proposed in 1637, at the close of the Pequod war. It was favorably received 
by all, but the union was not consummated until 1643, Vydien the colonies of Ply- 
mouth,® Massachusetts," Connecticut and New Haven'" confederated for mutual 
Tvelfare. Rhode Island asked for admittance into the Union [1643}, but was 
refused," unless it would acknowledge the authority of Plymouth. Local juris- 
diction was jealously reserved by each colony, and the fatal doctrine of State 
Supremacy was thus early developed. It was a confederacy of States like our 
early Union.'- The general affairs of the confederacy were managed by a 
Ijoard of commissioners, consisting of two church-members from each colony, 
who were to meet annually, or oftener if required. Their duty was to con- 
sider circumstances, and recommend measures for the general good. They 
had no executive jjower. Their propositions were considered and acted upon by 
the several colonies, each assuming an independent sovereignty. This confed- 



' The Archbishop of Canterbury and associates received full power to establish governments and 
laws over the American settlements ; to regulate religious matters ; inflict punishments, and even 
to revoke charters. '^ Note 3, page 107. 

^ In 1636, the General Court at Boston appropriated two thousand dollars for the estabhshment 
of a college. In 1638, Rev. John Harvard bequeathed more than three thousand dollars to the 
institution which was then located at Cambridge, and it received the name of "Harvard College," 
now one of the first seminaries of learning in the United States. In 1647, a law was passed, 
requiring every township, which contained fifty householders, to have a school-house, and employ 
a teacher ; and each town containing one thousand freeholders to have a grammar-school 

* Note 3, page 108. 

' The Dutch of New Netherland [page 72], stiU claimed jurisdiction upon the Connecticut 
River, and the French settlers in Acadie, eastward of New England, were becoming troublesome to 
the Puritans. 

° Note 3, p. 108. ' Page 72. ' Page 78. 'Page 117. 

'" Page 89. " Page 91. " Page 267. 



122 THE COLONIES. [1620. 

eracj remained unmolested more than forty years' [1643 — 1686], during which 
time the government of England was changed three times. 

The colony of Massachusetts Bay was always the leading one of New En- 
gland, and assumed to be a " perfect republic." After the Union, a legislative 
change took place. The representatives had hitherto held their sessions in the 
same room with the governor and council ; now they convened in a separate 
apartment ; and the distinct House of Representatives, or democratic branch 
of the legislature, still existing in our Federal and State Governments, was 
established in 1644. Unlike Virginia,^ the colonists of New England sympa- 
thized with the English republicans, in their efforts to abolish royalty. 
Ardently attached to the Parliament, they found in Cromwell,^ when he 
assumed supreme authority, a sincere friend and protector of their liberties. 
No longer annoyed by the frowns and menaces of royalty, the energies of the 
people were rapidly developed, and profitable commerce was created between 

Massachusetts and the West Indies. This 




'"""^^ JtyTrr^'N. trade brought bullion, or uncoined gold and 
V^\\^*M*^,^^ silver, into the colony ; and in 1652, the 



it=;ii^7r^T-' 1^1 authorities exercised a prerogative of in- 

■%^\, •^/^l dependent sovereiarnty, by establishins; a 

X^^ikv"^ mmt, and commg silver money, the first 

X...0....'-"" within the territory of the United States. 

FIRST MONEY COINED IN TUE LNITEJJ w • .\ .x1 x • xl, 

STATES. During the same year, settlements m the 

present State of Maine, imitating the act of 
those of New Hampshire,* eleven years earlier [1641], came under the juris- 
diction of Massachusetts. 

And now an important element of trouble and perplexity was introduced. 
There arrived in Boston, in July, 1656, two zealous religious women, named 
Mary Fisher and Ann Austin, who were called Quakers. This was a sect 
recently evolved from the heaving masses of English society," claiming to be 
more rigid Puritans than all who had preceded them. Letters unfavorable to 
the sect had been received in the colony, and the two women were cast into 
prison, and confined for several weeks.^ With eight others who arrived during 

' When James the Second came to the throne, the charters of all the colonies were taken away 
or suspended. When local governments were re-established after the Revolution of 1688, there no- 
longer existed a necessity for the Union, and the confederacy was dissolved. 

^ Page 108. ' Note 3, page 108. 

* In October, 1651, the general court or legislature of Massachusetts ordered silver coins of tha 
values of threepence, sixpence, and a shilling sterling, to be made. The mint-master was allowed 
fifteen pence out of every twenty shillings, for his trouble. He made a large fortune by the busi- 
ness. From the circumstance that the efifigy of a pine-tree was stamped on one side, these coins, 
now very rare, are called pine-tree money. The date [1652] was not altered for thirty years Mas- 
sachusetts was also the first to issue paper money in the shape of treasury notes. See page 132. 

^ Page 80. 

" The founder of the sect was George Fox, who promulgated his peculiar tenets about 1650. 
He was a man of education and exalted purity of character, and soon, learned and influential men, 
became his co-workers. They still maintain the highest character for morality and practical Chris- 
tianity. See note 7, page 94. 

' Their trunks were searched, and the religious books found in them were burned by the hang- 
man, on Boston Common. Suspected of being witches [note 7, page 132], their persons wer& 
examined in order to discover certain marks which would mdicate their connection with the Evil One. 



1755.] MASSACHUSETTS. 123 

the year, thej were sent back to England/ Others came, and a special act 
against the Quakers was put in force [1657], but to no purpose. Opposition 
increased their zeal, and, as usual with enthusiasts, precisely because they were 
not wanted, they came. Tliey suffered stripes, imprisonments, and general 
contempt ; and finally, in 1658, on the recommendation of the Federal Com- 
missioners," Massachusetts, by a majority of one vote, banished them, on pain 
of death. The excuse pleaded in extenuation of this barbarous law was, that 
the Quakers preached doctrines dangerous to good government.' But the death 
penalty did not deter the exiles from returning ; and many others came because 
they courted the martyr's reward. Some were hanged, others were publicly 
whipped, and the prisons were soon filled with the persecuted sect. The sever- 
ity of the law finally caused a strong expression of public sentiment against it. 
The Quakers were regarded as true martyrs, and the people demanded of the 
magistrates a cessation of the bloody and barbarous punishments. The death 
penalty was abolished, in 1661 ; the fanaticism of the magistrates and the 
Quakers subsided, and a more Christian spirit of toleration prevailed. No 
longer sufferers for opinion's sake, the Quakers turned their attention to the 
Indian tribes, and nobly seconded the efforts of Mahew and Eliot in the propa- 
gation of the gospel among the pagans of the forest.^ 

On the restoration of monarchy in 1660, the judges who condemned Charles 
the First to the block, were outlawed. Two of them (William Goffe and Edward 
Whalley) fled to America, and were the first to announce at Boston the acces- 
sion of Charles the Second. Orders were sent to the colonial authorities for 
their arrest, and officers were dispatched from England for the same purpose. 
The colonists effectually concealed them, and for this act, and the general sym- 
pathy manifested by ISew England for the republican party, the king resolved 
to show them no favor. They had been exempt from commercial restrictions 
during Cromwell's administration ; now these were revived, and the stringent 
provisions of a new Navigation Act^ were rigorously enforced. The people 
Tainly petitioned for relief; and finally, commissioners were sent [August, 
1664] "to hear and determine all complaints that might exist in New England, 
and take such measures as they might deem expedient for settling the peace 
and security of the country on a solid foundation." ^ This was an unwise 

' Mary Fisher went all the way from London to Adrianople, to carry a divine message to the 
Sultan. She was regarded as insane ; and as the Moslems respect such people as special favorites 
^f God, Mary Fisher was unharmed in the Sultan's dominions. * Page 121. 

' The Quakers denied all human authority, and regarded the power of magistrates as delegated 
tyranny. They preached purity of life, cliarity in its broadest sense, and denied the nglit of any 
man to control the opinions of another. Conscience, or "the liglit within," was considered a suf- 
Scient guide, and they deemed it their special mission to denounce "hireling ministers" and "per- 
secuting magistrates," in person. It was tliis offensive boldness which engendered the violent 
hatred toward the sect in England and America. 
. ^ ■• John Eliot has been truly called the Apostle to the Indians. He began his labors soon after 
his arrival in America, and founded the first church among the savages, at Natic, in 1660, at which 
time there were ten towns of converted Indians in Massachusetts. Thirty-five years later, it was 
estimated that there were not less than three thousand adult Christian Indians in the Islands of 
Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket, alone. ^ Note 4, page 109. 

' Tliese were Colonel Richard Nicolls, Sir Robert Carr, George Cart-wTight and Richard Maver- 
ick. They came with a royal fleet, commanded by Colonel Nicolls, which had been sent xo ; 
English authority over the possessions of the Dutch, in New Netherland. See page 14-1. 



124 MASSACHUSETTS. [162(V 

movement on the part of the mother country. The colonists regarded the 
measure with indignation, not only as a violation of their charters, but as an 
incipient step toward establishing a system of domination, destructive to their 
liberties. Massachusetts boldly protested against the exercise of the authority 
of the commissioners within her limits, but at the same time asserted her loyalty 
to the sovereign. The commissioners experienced the opposition of the other 
New England colonies, except Rhode Island. Their acts were generally disre- 
garded, and after producing a great deal of irritation, they were recalled in 
1666. The people of Massachusetts, triumphant in their opposition to royal 
oppression, ever afterward took a front rank in the march toward complete 
freedom. The licentious king and his ministers were too much in love with 
voluptuous ease, to trouble themselves with far-off colonies ; and while Old 
England was suffering from bad government, and the puissance of the throne 
was lessening in the estimation of the nations, the colonies flourished in purity, 
peace, and strength, until Metacomet^ the son of the good Massasoit,^ 
iindled a most disastrous Indian Avar, known in history as 



KING PHILIP'S WAR. 

Massasolt kept his treaty with the Plymouth 
colony" faithfully while' he lived. Metacomet, or 
PhiUp,^ resumed the covenants of friendship, and 
kept them inviolate for a dozen years. But as 
spreading settlements Avere reducing his domains acre 
by acre, breaking up his hunting grounds, diminish- 
ing his fisheries, and menacing his nation with servi- 
tude or annihilation, his patriotism was aroused, and 
he willingly listened to the hot young warriors of his 
tribe, who counseled a war of extermination against 
KING PHILIP. the English. At Mount Hope^ the seat of the chief 

sachems of the Wampanoags, in the solitudes of the 
primeval forests, he planned, with consummate skill, an alliance of all the New 
England tribes,^ against the European intruders. 

At this time, there were four hundred " praying Indians," as the converts 
to Christianity were called, firmly attached to the white people. One of them, 
named John Sassamon, who had been educated at Cambridge, and was a sort of 
secretary to Philip, after becoming acquainted with the plans of the sachem, 

^ Page 114. ' Page 114. 

^ Massasoit had two sons, whom Governor Price named Alexander and PhiHp, in comphment 
to their bravery as warriors. Alexander died soon after the decease of his fatlier ; and Philip 
became chief sachem of the Wampanoags. 

* Mount Hope is a conical hill, 300 feet in height, and situated on the west side of Mount Hope 
Bav, about two miles from Bristol, Rhode Island. It was called Pokanoket by the Indians. 

* The tribes which became involved in this war numbered, probably, about twenty-five thousand 
souls. Those along the coast of Massachusetts Bay, who had sufiered terribly by a pestilence just 
before the Pilgrijis came [page 77], had materially increased in numbers ; and other tribes, besides 
the New England Indians proper [page 22], became parties to the conflict. 




1755.] MASSACHUSETTS. 125 

revealed them to the authorities at Plymouth. For this he was slain by his 
countrymen, and three Wampanoags were convicted of his murder, on slender 
testimony, and hanged. The ire of the tribe was fiercely kindled, and they 
thirsted for vengeance. The cautious Philip was overruled by his fiery young 
men, and remembering the wrongs and humiliations he had personally received 
from the English,' he trampled upon solemn treaties, sent his women and chil- 
dren to the Narragansetts for protection, and kindled the flame of war. Mes- 
sengers were sent to other tribes, to arouse them to co-operation, and with all 
the power of Indian eloquence, Metacomet exhorted his followers to curse the^ 
white men, and swear eternal hostility to the pale faces. He said, in effect : 

"Away I away ! I will not hear 

Of aught but death or vengeance now ; 
By the eternal skies I swear 

My knee shall never learn to bow ! 
I will not hear a word of peace, 

Nor clasp in friendly grasp a hand 
Linked to that pale-browed stranger race, 
That works the ruin of our land. 
****** 

And tiU your last white foe shall kneel, 

And in his coward pangs expire, 
Sleep — but to dream of brand and steel ; 

"Wake — but to deal in blood and fire!" 

Although fierce and determined when once aroused, no doubt Philip com- 
menced hostilities contrary to the teachings of his better judgment, for he was 
sagacious enough to foresee failure. " Frenzy prompted their rising. It was 
but the storm in which the ancient inhabitants of the land were to vanish away. 
They rose without hope, and therefore they fought without mercy. To them, 
as a nation, there was no to-morrow." 

The bold Philip struck the first blow at Swanzey, thirty-five miles south- 
west from Plymouth. The people were just returning from their houses of 
worship, for it was a day of fasting and humiliation [July 4, 1675], in antici- 
pation of hostilities. Many were slain and captured, and others fled to tha 
surrounding settlements, and aroused the people. The men of Plymouth, 
joined by those of Boston and vicinity, pressed toward Mount Hope. Philip 
was besieged in a swamp for many days, but escaped with most of his warriors, 
and became a fugitive with the Nipmucs,^ an interior tribe of Massachusetts. 
These espoused his cause, and with full fifteen hundred warriors, he hastene(?' 
toward the white settlements in the far-off valley of the Connecticut. In the 
mean while the little army of white people penetrated the country of the Narra^ 
gansetts,^ and extorted a treaty of friendship from Canonchet,* chief sachem of 

* In 1671, Philip and his tribe being suspected of secretly plotting the destruction of the Ea 
glish, were deprived of their fire-arms. He never forgot the injury, and long meditated revenge. 

* Page 22. ' Page 22. 

* Son of Miantonomoh, whose residence was upon a hill a Uttle north of the city of Newport, 
R. I. That hill still bears the name of Miantonomoh, abbreviated to " Tonomy HiU." Page 91. 



12Q THE COLONIES. [1620. 

that powerful tribe. Hearing of this, Philip was dismayed for a moment. But 
there Avas no hope for him, except in energetic action, and he and his followers 
aroused other tribes, to a war of extermination, by the secret and efficient 
methods of treachery, ambush, and surprise. Men in the fields, fiimilies in 
their beds at midnight, and congregations in houses of worship, were attacked 
and massacred. The Indians hung like the scythe of death upon the borders 
of the English settlements, and for several months a gloomy apprehension of the 
extermination of the whole European population in New England, prevailed.' 

Dreadful were the scenes in the path of the Wampanoag chief. From 
Springfield northward to the present Vermont line, the valley of the Connecti- 
cut was a theater of confusion, desolation, and death, wherever white settle- 
ments existed. Almost the whole of a party of twenty Englishmen"^ sent to 
treat with the Nipmucs, were treacherously slain by the savages in ambush 
[Aug. 12, 1675], near Quaboag, now Brookfield. That place was set on fire, 
when a shower of rain put out the flames, and the Indians were driven away by 
a relief party of white people.^ The village was partially saved, but imme- 
diately abandoned. Soon afterward a hot battle was fought near Deerfield* 
[Sept 5], and a week later [Sept. 12] that settlement also was laid in ashes. 
On the same day (it was the Sabbath), Hadley, further down the river, waa 
attacked while the people were worshiping In the midst of the alarm and con- 
fusion, a tall and venerable-looking man, with white, floAving hair and beard, 
suddenly appeared, and brandishing a glittering sword, he placed himself at the 
head of the affrighted people, and led them to a charge which dispersed and 
defeated the foe. He as suddenly disappeared, and the inhabitants believed 
that an angel from heaven had been sent to their rescue. It was Gofie, the 
fugitive English judge,^ who was then concealed in that settlement. 

The scourge, stayed for a moment at Hadley, swept mercilessly over other 
settlements. On the 23d of September, the paths of Northfield Avere wet with 
the blood of many valiant young men under Captain Beers ; and on the 28th, 
" a company of young men, the very flower of Essex," under Cixptain Lathrop, 
were butchered by almost a thousand Indians on the banks of a little stream 
near Deerfield, which still bears the name of Bloody Brook. Others, who 
€ame to their rescue, were engaged many hours in combat Avith the Indians 
until crowned Avith victory. Yet the Indians still prevailed. Philip, en- 
couraged by success, now resolved to attack Hatfield, the chief settlement of the 



' The white population in New England, at this time, has been estimated at fifty-five thousand. 
HaverhOl, on the Merrimac, was the frontier town in the direction of Mame; and Northfield, on the 
borders of Vermont, was the highest settlement in the Connecticut valley. "Westfield, one hundred 
miles west of Boston, was the most remote settlement in that direction. 

^ Captains Wheeler and Hutchinson were sent from Boston to endeavor to reclaim the Nipraucs. 
Apprised of their coming, the Indians lay in ambush, and fired upon them from tlie deep thickets 
of a swamp. 

^ Under Major "Willard. The Indians set fire to every house except a strong one into which 
the people had secured themselves, and were besieged there two days. The Indians set fire to this 
last refuge, when rain extinguished the flames. 

* Between 180 white people and 700 Indians. [See, also, page 135.] * Page 123. 



1755.] MASSACHUSETTS. 127 

white people above Springfield. The Springfield Indians joined him,' and with 
almost a thousand warriors, he fell upon the settlement, on the 29th of Octo- 
ber, 1675. The English were prepared for his reception, and he was repulsed 
with such loss, that, gathering his broken forces on the eastern bank of the 
Connecticut,^ he marched toward Rhode Island. The Narragansetts, in viola- 
tion of the recent treaty,^ received him, became his allies, and went out upon 
the war path late in autumn. A terrible, retributive blow soon fell upon the 
savages, when fifteen hundred men of Massachusetts, Plymouth, and Connecti- 
cut, marched to punish Canonchet and his tribe, for their perfidy. The snows 
of early winter had fiillen, and at least three thousand Indians had collected in 
their chief fort in an immense swamp, •* where they were supplied with provi- 
sions for the winter. It was a stormy day in December [Dec. 19], Avhcn the 
English stood before the feeble palissades of the savages. These offered but 
little opposition to the besiegers ; and within a few hours, five hundred wig- 
wams, with the winter provisions, were in flames. Hundreds of men, women, 
and children, perished in the fire. A thousand warriors were slain or wounded, 
and several hundreds w^ere made prisoners. The English lost eighty killed, 
and one hundred and fifty wounded. Canonchet was made prisoner, and slain ; 
but Philip escaped, and with the remnant of the Narragansetts, he took refuge 
again with the Nipmucs. 

The fugitive Wampanoag was busy during the winter. He vainly solicited 
the Mohawks^ to join him, but he was seconded by the tribes eastward of Mas- 
sachusetts,"^ who also had wrongs to redress. The work of desolation began 
early in the spring of 1676, and within a few weeks the war extended over a 
space of almost three hundred miles. Weymouth, Groton, Medfield, Lancas- 
ter, and Marlborough, in Massachusetts, Avere laid in ashes ; Warwick and 
Providence, in Rhode Island, were burned ; and everywhere, the isolated dwell- 
ings of settlers were laid waste. But internal feuds weakened the power of the 
savages ; and both the Nipmucs'' and the Narragansetts- charged their misfor- 
tunes to the ambition of Philip. The cords of alliance were severed. Some 
surrendered to avoid starvation ; other tribes wandered oif and joined those in 
€anada f while Captain Benjamin Church," the most famous of the partisan 




• They had been friendly until now. They plotted the entire 
destruction of the Springfield settlement ; but the people defended 
themselves bravely within their palisaded Iiouses. Many of the 
strong houses of frontier settlements were thus fortified. Truiilcs 
of trees, eight or ten inches in diameter, were cut in uniform lengths, 
and stuck in the ground close together. The upper ends ^^-ere 
sharpened, and the whole were fastened together with green witlies 
or other contrivances. "~^^ 

^ Page 82. = Page 125. pvusu^h. blii uim.s 

* This swamp is a small distance south-west of the village of Kingston, in "Waslungtou County, 
Rhode Island. The fort was on an island which contains about five acres of tillalile land, in the 
north-west part of the swamp. The Stonington and Providence railway passes along the northern 
verge of the swamp. ^ Page 23. 

^ Page 22. The tribes of Maine were then about four thousand strong- 

' Page 22. « Page 22. » Page 22. 

" Benjamin Churcli was born at Plymouth, Massachusetts, in 1639. He continued hostilities 

Against the eastern Indians until 1704. He fell from his hgrse, and died soon afterward, at Little 

Compton, Jan. 17, 1718, aged 77 years. 



128 THE COLONIES. [1620. 

officers of the English colonies, went out to hunt and to destroy the fugitives. 
During the year, between two and three thousand Indians were slain or had 
submitted. Philip was chased from one hiding-place to another, but for a long 
time he would not yield. He once cleft the head of a warrior who proposed 
submission. But at length, the " last of the Wampanoags" bowed to the press- 
ure of circumstances. He returned to the land of his fathers' [August, 1676], 
and soon his wife and son were made prisoners. This calamity crushed him, 
Q.nd he said, " Now my heart breaks ; I am ready to die.'' A few days after- 




^.ci^rh^^ .^^^lu-y^ 



ward, a faithless Indian shot him, and Captain Church cut off the dead sachem's 
head.* His body Avas quartered ; and his little son was sold to be a bond-slave 
in Bermuda.^ So perished the last of the princes of the Wampanoags, and 
thus ended, in the total destruction of the power of the New England Indians, 
the famous King Philip's War." 

The terrible menaces of the Indian war, and the hourly alarm which it 
occasioned, did not make the English settlers unmindful of their political posi- 

' Note 4, page 124. 

' The rude sword, made by a blacksmith of the colony, with which Captain Church cut oflT 
Philip's head, is in the possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society. 

' The disposal of the boy was a subject of serious deliberation. Some of the elders proposed 
putting him to death; others, professing more mercy, suggested selling him as a slave. The most 
profitable measure appeared the most merciful and the child was sold into bondage. The head of 
Philip was carried in triumph to Plymouth, and placed upon a pole 

* The result of tliis war was vastly beneticial to the colonists, for the fear of savages, which 
prevented a rapid spread of settlements, was removed. From this period may be dated the real, 
unimpeded growth of New England. 



1755.] MASSACHUSETTS. 129 

tion, nor hopeless respecting the future. While the Massachusetts colony was 
yet weak in resources, from the effects of the war/ and the people were yet 
engaged in hostilities with the eastern tribes,- it made territorial accessions by 
purchase, and at the same time boldly asserted its chartered rights. For many 
years there had been a controversy between the heirs of Sir F. Gorges^ and 
John Mason, and the Massachusetts colony, concerning a portion of the present 
territory of Maine and New Hampshire, which, by acts of the inhabitants, had 
been placed [1641 and 1652] under the jurisdiction of the authorities at Bos- 
ton.^ The judicial decision [167T] was in favor of the heirs, and Massachu- 
setts immediately purchased [May 1, 1677] their interest for six thousand dol- 
lars.^ New Hampshire was detached three years afterward [1680], and made 
a royal province — the first in New England ; but Maine, which was incorpo- 
rated with Massachusetts in 1692, continued a part of that commomvealth until 
1820. 

Now rapidly budded that governmental tyranny which finally drove all the 
American colonies into open rebellion. The profligate king continued to draw 
the lines of absolute rule closer and closer in England, and he both feared and 
hated the growing republics in America, especially those in the East. They 
were ostensibly loyal portions of his realm, but were really independent sover- 
eignties, continually reacting upon the mother country, to the damage of the 
'• divine right" of kings. Charles had long cherished a desire to take their 
governments into his own hands, and he employed the occasion of the rejection 
of Edward Randolph (a custom-house officer, who had been sent to Boston 
[1679] to collect the revenues, and otherwise to exercise authority"), to declare 
the Massachusetts charter void. He issued a quo warranto in 1683,^ and pro- 
cured a decision in his favor in the High Court of Chancery, on the 28th of 
June, 1684, but he died on the 26th of February following, before his object 
was effected. 

Charles's successor, James the Second, ^ continued the oppressive measures 
of his brother toward the New England colonies. The people petitioned and 
remonstrated, and were treated with contempt. Their hardships in conquering 
a wilderness, and their devotion to the English constitution, had no weight 
with the royal bigot. ^ He also declared the charter of Massachusetts forfeited, 
and appointed Joseph Dudley president of the country from Bhode Island to 
Nova Scotia. Sir Edmund Andros arrived at Boston soon afterward [Dec. 

' During the war, New England lost six hundred men ; a dozen towns were destroyed ; six 
hundred dwellings were burned ; every twentieth lamily was houseless ; and every t\\ entieth man, 
who had served as a soldier, had perished. The cost of the war equaled five hundred thousand 
dollars — a very large sum at that time. 

* Page 22. ^ Page 79. * Page 80, and note 2, page 80. 

° The portion of Maine then purchased, was the tract between the Piscataqua and the Kenne. 
bee. That between the Kennebec and the Penobscot belonged to the Duke of York, and the terri- 
tory between tlie Penobscot and the St. Croix, was held by the French, pursuant to a treaty. 

® Randolph appears to have been a greedy adventurer, and was, consequently, a faithful servant 
of his royal master in oppressing the colonists. He exaggerated the number and resources of the 
people of New England, and thus excited the king's fears and cupidity. Previous to Randolph's 
appointment, the colonies had dispatched agents to England, to settle impending difficulties ami- 
cably. They failed, and Randolph came in the same vessel in which they returned. 

■" Note 3, page 107. '* Page 113. ' Note 7, page 113. 



130 TJI^ COLONIES. [1620. 

30, 1686], clothed with authority to govern all New England. He came with 
a smiling face, and deceitful lips. He appears to have been a tyrant by nature, 
and came to execute a despot's will. He soon made bare the rod of oppression, 
and began to rule with a tyrant's rigor.' The people were about to practice 
the doctrine that '■'■resistance to tyrants is obedience to God,''^^ when intelli- 
gence reached Boston [April 14, 1689], that James was driven from the 
throne [1688] and was succeeded by William and Mary, of Orange.* The 
inhabitants of Boston seized and imprisoned Andros and fifty of his political 
associates [April 28, 1689], sent them to England under a just charge of mal- 
administration of public aifairs, and re-established their constitutional govern- 
ment. Again republicanism was triumphant in Massachusetts. 

The effects of the revolution in England were also sorrowful to the Amer- 
ican colonies. That revolution became a cause of war between England and 
France. James (who was a Roman Catholic) fled to the court of Louis the 
Fourteenth, king of France, and that monarch espoused the cause of the fugi- 
tive. Hostilities between the two nations commenced the same year, and the 
quarrel extended to their respective colonies in America. The conflict then 
commenced, and which was continued more than seven years, is known in his- 
tory as 

KING- WILLIAM'S "WAR. 

The colonists suffered terribly in that contest. The French Jesuits,^ who 
had acquired great influence over the eastern tribes,^ easily excited them to 
renew their fierce warfare with the English. They also made the savages their 
allies ; and all along the frontier settlements, the pathway of murder and des- 
olation was seen. Dover, a frontier town, was first attacked by a party of 
French and Indians, on the 7th of July, 1689, when the venerable Major 
Waldron'^ and twenty others of the little garrison were killed. Twenty-nine 
of the inhabitants were made captive, and sold as servants to the French in 
Canada. In August following, an Indian war party, instigated by Thury, a 
Jesuit, fell [August 12] upon an English stockade'' at Pemaquid (built by 
Andros), and captured the garrison. A few months later, Frontenac sent a 

* Among other arbitrary acts, Andros laid restraints upon the freedom of the press, and mar- 
riage contracts; and, to use a modern term, he "levied black mail;" that is, extorted money, by 
menaces, wlienever opportunity offered. He advanced the fees of all officers of the government to 
an exorbitant degree ; and Unally threatened to make the Church of England the established relig- 
ion in all America 

" This was Cromwell's motto ; and Thomas Jefferson had it engraved upon his private seal. 

* Note 7, page 113. 

* This was a Roman Catliolic religious order, founded by Ignatius Loyola, a Spaniard, hi 1539. 
They have ever been remarkable for their great devotion to their cause, their self-denial, and mas- 
terly sagacity in the acquirement and maintenance of power. Their missionaries preached Chris- 
tianity in every part of the habitable globe. They came with tlie first French adventurers to Amer- 
ica, and under their influence, whole tribes of Indians eastward of Massachusetts and in Canada were 
made nominal Christians. This was one of the ties which made the savages such faitliful alUes to 
the French in the contests between them and the English, previous to ] 763. ' Page 22. 

° "VValdron was eighty years of age. He had played false with tlie New Hampshu-e Indians 
during King Philip's war, and they now sought revenge. They tortured him to death. 
^ Note 2, page 183. 



1755.] MASSACHUSETTS. 131 

party of three hundred French and Indians from Montreal, to penetrate the 
country toward Albany. On a gloomy night in winter, when the snow was 
twenty inches in depth, they fell upon Schenectada [Feb. 18, 1690], a frontier 
town on the Mohawk, massacred many of the people, and burnt the village. 
Early in the spring, Saliuou Falls [March 28], Casco [May 27], and other 
eastern villages, were attacked by another party of the same mongrel foe, the 

natural ferocity of the Indians being quickened by the influence of tln' 

Jesuits who accompanied them.' 

All the colonies were aroused, by these atrocities, to a sense of their danger 
in having such foes intent upon their destruction ; and the New England people 
resolved on speedy retaliation. In May, Massachusetts fitted out an expedi- 
tion, under Sir William Phipps, a native of Pemaquid, consisting of eight or 
nine vessels, with about eight hundred men. Phipps seized Port Royal,- in 
Acadie, and obtained sufficient plunder from the inhabitants to pay the expenses 
of the expedition. In June, Port Royal was again plundered by English pri- 
vateers from the West Indies. Encouraged by these successes, the colonies of 
New England and New York coalesced in efforts to conquer Canada.^ It was 
arranged to send a land expedition from New York, by way of Lake Cham- 
plain, against Montreal,* and a naval expedition against Quebec* The com- 
mand of the former was intrusted to the son of Governor Winthrop of Connect- 
icut,^ and the expenses were borne jointly by that colony and New Y^'ork.' Sir 
William Phipps commanded the latter, which Massachusetts alone fitted out. 
It consisted of thirty-four vessels, with two thousand men. Both were unsuc- 
cessful. Some of Winthrop's troops, with Indians of the Five Nations,^ under 
Colonel Schuyler, pushed toward the St. Lawrence, and were repulsed [Aug., 
1690] by Frontenac, the governor of Canada. The remainder did not go be- 
yond Wood Creek (now Whitehall), at the head of Lake Champlain, and all 
returned to Albany.^ Phipps reached Quebec about the middle of October, 
and landed the troops ; but the city was too strongly fortified'" to promise a 

Massa- 

' In this warfare, instigated by the Jesuits, was found a ready defence for tlie intoli'- 
rance of the Protestant majority in Maryland [page 152], the disabilities of Roman Cath- 
olics in Virginia, New York, and New England, and their exclusion from the privileges 
of freemen in tolerant Rhode Island. The colonists believed that the most potent operations 
of the Jesuits were in secret, and came to regard every Roman Catiiolic as the natural 
enemy of Protestants, and as laboring to destroy every measure tending to human freedoi?!. 

' Page 58. ' Page 204. * Page 48. 

' Page 48. ^ Page 86. 

' Jklilborne, son-in-law of Jacob Leisler, the democratic governor of New York [page 148], un- 
dertook to provide subsistence for the army, which marched from Albany early in July. 

" Page 23. 

" Leisler was so much incensed at this failure, that he caused the arrest of Winthrop, at Albany 
There had ever been a jealous rivalry between the people of New York and Connecticut ; and tlio 
leud whicli continually prevailed among the mixed troops, was the chief cause of the miscarriage of 
the enterprise. 

'" Phipps, having no chart to guide him, was nine weeks cautiously making his way around 
Acadie and up the St. Lawrence. In the mean while, a swift Indian runner, from Pemaquid, sped 
across the country, and informed the French, at Quebec, of the approach of Pliipps, in time for 
them to v/ell prepare for defense. 

" This repulse was considered so important by the French, that king Louis had a commemor- 
ative rr-edal struck, with the legend — " Fkance Victorious in the New "World." 



132 THE COLONIES. [1-620! 

chusetts was obliged to issue bills of credit, or paper monej, to defray the 
expenses of this expedition/ 

Sir William Phipps was sent to England soon after his return, to solicit aid 
in further warfare upon the French and Indians, and also to assist in efforts to 
procure a restoration of the charter of Massachusetts, taken away bj King 
James.'^ Material assistance in prosecuting the war. was refused; and King 
William instead of restoring the old charter, granted a new one, and united 
tinder it the colonies of Plymouth, INIassachusetts, Maine, and Nova Scotia,' by 
the old name of Massachusetts Bay Colony^ and made it a royal province. 
Phipps was appointed governor by the king, and returned to Boston with the- 
charter, in May, 1692. But the new constitution was offensive to the people, 
for they were allowed scarcely any other political privileges than they already 
possessed, except the right to choose representatives. The king reserved the 
right to appoint the governor, his deputy, and the secretary of the colony, and 
of repealing the laws within three years after their passage. This abridgment 
of their liberties produced general dissatisfaction, and alienated the affections of 
the people from the mother country. It was one of a series of fatal steps taken 
by the English government, which tended toward the final dismemberment of 
the empire in 1776.^ Yet one good resulted from the change. The theocratic 
or religious element in the government, which fostered bigotry and intolerance, 
lost its power, for toleration was guarantied to all Christian sects, except Roman 
Catholics ; and the right of suffrage was extended to others than members of 
Congregational churches.^ 

A very strange episode in the history of Massachusetts now occurred. A 
belief in witchcraft" destroyed the peace of society in many communities, and 
shrouded the whole colony in a cloud of gloom. This belief had a strong hold 
upon the minds of the people of old England, and of their brethren in America . 
Excitement upon the subject suddenly broke out at Dan vers (then a part of 
Salem), in March, 1692, and spread like an epidemic. A niece and daughter 
of the parish minister exhibited strange conduct ; and under the influence of 
their OAvn superstitious belief, they accused an old Indian servant-woman in the 
family of bewitching them. Fasting and prayer, to break the "spell," were 
of no avail, for the malady increased. The alarm of the family spread to the 

' Note 4, page 122. The total amount of the issue was $133,338. "^ Page 129. 

° New Scotland, the name given to the country which- the French called Acadie. See note 2, 
page 80. ^ Page 251. * Note 5, page 118. 

^ A belief in witchcraft, or the exercise of supernatural power, by men and women, has been 
prevalent for ages. Punishment of persons accused of it, was first sanctioned by the Church of Rome 
a Uttle more than three hundred years ago. ■ Certain tests were instituted, and thousands of innocent 
persons were burned alive, drowned, or hanged, in Europe. Within three months, in 1515, five hun- 
dred persons were burned in Geneva, in Switzerland. In the diocese of Como, one thousand were 
burned in one year. In 1520, an incredible number, from among all classes, suffered death in 
Prance. And within fifty or sixty years, during the sixteenth century, more than one hundred 
thousand persons perished in the flames in Germany alone. Henry the Eighth of England made 
the practice of witchcraft a capital offense; and a hundred years later, " witch-detectors" traversed 
the country, and brought many to tlie stake. Enlightened men embraced the belief; and even Sir 
Matthew Hale, the most distinguished of England'sjudges, repeatedly tried and condemned persons 
accused of witchcraft. The English laws against witchcraft were adopted in New England ; and as 
early as 1648, four persons had suffered death for the alleged offense, in the vicinity of Boston. 



1755.] - MASSACHUSETTS. 133 

community ; and soon a belief prevailed throughout the colony, that evil spirits, 
having ministering servants among men, overshadowed the land. Old and ill- 
favored women were first accused of practising the art of witchcraft ; but at 
length neither age, sex, nor condition afforded protection from the accuser's 
tongue. Even the wife of Governor Phipps did not escape suspicion. Magis- 
trates were condemned, many pious persons were imprisoned, and Mr. Bur- 
roughs, a worthy minister, was executed. Men of strong minds and scholarly 
attainments were thoroughly deluded. Among these was the eminent Cotton 
Mather, whose father before him had yielded to the superstition, and published 




(^oUr(rn 7na4uY. 



«,n account of all the supposed cases of witchcraft in New England. Cotton 
Mather, on account of his position as a leading divine, and his talents, prob- 
ably did more than any other man to promote the spread of that fearful delusion, 
■which prevailed for more than six months. During that time, twenty persons 
-suffered death, fifty-five were tortured or frightened into a confession of witch- 
craft, and when a special court, or legislature, was convened in October, 1692, 
one hundred and fifty accused persons were in prison. A reaction, almost as 
sudden as the beginning of the excitement, now took place in the public mind. 
The prison doors were opened to the accused, and soon many of the accusers 
shrunk abashed from the public gaze.' Standing in the light of the present 
•century, we look back to " Salem witchcraft," as it is called, with amazement. 

' The belief in witchcraft did not cease with the strange excitement ; and Cotton Mather and 
•other popular men, wrote \\\ its defense. Culef a citizen of Boston, exposed ^Mather's credulity, 
which greatly irritated the minister. He first called his opponent "a wjaver turned minister;" 
but as his tormentor's blows fell thick and fast, in a series of letters, Mather called him " a coal from 



134 THE COLONIES. [1C20. 

"King "William's war" ^ continued until 1697, when a treaty of peace,, 
made at Ryswick, in the west of Holland, on the 20th of September of that 
year, terminated hostilities.'' Up to that time, and later, the New England 
people suffered greatly from their mongrel foe. Remote settlements in the 
direction of Canada and Nova Scotia continued to be harassed. Almost a hun- 
dred persons were killed or made captive [July 28, 1694] at Oyster River 
(now Durham), ten miles from Portsmouth, in New Hampshire. Two yeara 
later [July 25, 1696], Baron St. Castine, and a large force of French and 
Indians, captured the garrison at Pemaquid, and exchanged the prisoners for 
French soldiers in the hands of the English.' In March, 1697, Haverhill, 
thirty miles from Boston, was attacked, and forty persons were killed or carried 
into captivity ;* and during the following summer, more remote settlers were 
great sufferers. A respite now came. The treaty at Ryswick produced a lull 
in the storm of cruel warfare, which had so long hung upon the English fron- 
tiers, continually menacing the colonists with wide-spread destruction.^ It was 
very brief, however, for pretexts for another war were not long wanting. 
James the Second died in Septemberj 1701, and Louis the Fourteenth, who 
had sheltered the exile,^ acknowledged his son, Prince James (commonly 
known as the Pretender), to be the lawful heir to the English throne. This 
offended the English, because the crown had been settled upon Anne, second 
daughter of James, who was a Protestant. Louis had also offended the English 
by placing his grandson, Philip of Anjou, upon the tlirone of Spain, and tlms 

hell," and prosecuted him for slander. The credulous clergyman was glad to withdraw the suit. 
Cotton Mather was bom in Boston, in February', 1633, and was educated at Harvard College. He 
was very expert in the acquirement of knowledge, and at the age of nineteen years, he received 
the degree of Master of Arts. He became a gospel minister at twenty-two, and holding a ready 
pen, he wrote much. Few of his writings have survived him. With all his learning, he was but a 
child in that which constitutes true manhood, and he is now regarded more as a pedant 
than as a scholar. Ho died in February, 1728. For the benefit of young men, we will 
here introduce an anecdote connected with him. It was thus related by Dr. Franklin, to Samuel, a 
son of Cotton Mather: "The last time I saw your father was in the beginning of 1724, when I 
visited him after my first trip to Pennsylvania. Ho received me in his library ; and on my taking^ 
leave, showed me a shorter way out of the house through a narrow passage, which was crossed by 
a beam overhead. We were still talking as I withdrew, he accompanying me behind, and I turn- 
ing partly toward Mm, wlien he said hastily, 'Stoop! stoop!' I did not understand until I felt my 
head hit against the beam. He was a man that never missed an occasion of giving instruction, 
and upon this he said to me, ' You are young, and have the world before you ; stoop as you go 
through, and you will escape many hard tliumps.' This advice, thus beat into my head, has fre- 
quently been of use to me; and I often think of it when I see pride mortified, and misfortunes 
brought upon people by carrying their heads too high." ' Page 130. 

^ This war cost England one hundred and fifty millions of dollars, in cash, besides a loan of one 
liundred millions more. This loan was the commencement of the enormous national debt of En- 
gland, now [1881] amounting to about four thousand millions of dollars. 

^ They also took the English fort of St. John's, Newfoundland, and several other posts on that 
island. 

* Among their captives was a Mrs. Dustan, her child, and nurse. Her infant was soon killed, 
and she and her nurse were taken to Canada. A little more than a month afterward, Mrs. D., her 
companion, and another prisoner, killed ten of twelve sleeping Indians, who had them m custody, 
and made their way back to Haverhill. 

* Just before the conclusion of this treaty, a Board of Trade and Plantations was established by 
the English government, whose duty it was to have a general oversight of the American colonies. 
This was a permanent commission, consisting of a president and seven members, called Lords of 
Trade. This commission was always an instrument of oppression in the hands of royalty, and, as 
will be seen, was a powerful promoter of that discontent which led to the rebellion of tbo rolonie* 
m 1775. " Page 130. 



1755.J MASSACHUSETTS. 135 

extended the influence of France among the dynasties of Europe. These, and 
some minor causes, impelled England again to declare war against France.' 
Hostilities commenced in 1702, and continued until a treaty of peace -was con- 
cluded at Utrecht, in Holland, on the 11th of April, 1713. As usual, the 
French and English in America were involved in this Avar ; and the latter suf- 
fered much from the cruelties of the Indians who were under the influence of 
the former. This is known in America as 

QUEEN ANNE'S WAR. 

It was a fortunate circumstance for the people of New^ York that the Five 
Nations had made a treaty of neutrality with the French in Canada [Aug. 4, 
1701 J, and thus became an impassable barrier against the savage hordes from 
the St. Lawrence. The tribes from the Merrimac to the Penobscot had made 
a treaty of peace with New England, in July, 1703, but the French induced 
them to violate it ; and before the close of summer, the hatchet fell upon the 
people of the whole frontier from Casco to Wells. Blood flowed in almost 
every valley; and early the next spring [March, 1704], a 
large party of French and Indians, under Major Hertel de 
Rouville, attacked Deerfield, on the Connecticut River, 
applied the torch, ^ killed forty of the inhabitants, and car- 
ried one hundred and twelve away to the wilderness. 
Among these was Rev. John Williams, the minister, whose 
little daughter, after a long residence with the Indians, williams's house. 
became attached to them, and married a Mohawk chief. ^ 
Similar scenes occurred at intervals during the whole progress of the war. 
Remote settlements were abandoned, and the people on the frontier collected in 
fortified houses,* and cultivated their fields in armed parties of half a dozen or 
more. This state of things became insupportable to the English colonists, and 
in the spring of 1707, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire, 
determined to chastise the French on their eastern borders. Connecticut 
refused to join in the enterprise, and the three colonies alone prepared an arma- 
ment. Early in June, a thousand men under Colonel Marsh, sailed from Nan- 
tucket for Port Royal,' in Acadie, convoyed by an English man-of-war. The 
French were prepared for them, and nothing was effected except the destruction 
of considerable property outside the fort. Three years later, an armament left 




* It is known in European history as the War of the Sjmm'sh Succession. 

' The only house that escaped the flames was that of the Rev. John "Williams, represented in 
the engraving. It stood near the centre of the village, until \vithin a few years. 

' Mrs. Williams and other captives, who were unable to-travel as rapidly as the Indians, M^ero 
murdered. On his arrival in Canada, Mr. Williams was treated with respect by the French, and 
after two years of captivity, was ransomed, and returned to Massachusetts. The chief object of "^ho 
expedition to Deerfield, appears to have been to carry off the bell tliat hung in Williams's church. 
That bell was purchased the year previous for the church of Saut St. Louis, at Caughuawaga, near 
Montreal The vessel in which it was brought from Havre was captured by a New England pri- 
vateer, and the bell was purchased for the Deerfield meeting-house. Father Nicolas, of the church 
at Caughnawaga, accompanied the expedition, and the bell was carried in triumph to its original 
destination, where it still remains. * Note 1, page 127. * Page 53. 



136 I'HE COLONIES. [1G20. 

Boston [September, 1710], and, in connection with a fleet from England, under 
Colonel Nicholson, demanded and obtained a surrender of the fort and garrison 
[Oct. 13 J, at Port Royal. The name of the place was then changed to Anna- 
polis, in honor of the Queen, Anne, and Acadie was annexed to the English 
realm under the title of Nova Scotia, or New Scotland, 

In Jul J, the following year [1711], Sir Hovendon Walker arrived at Bos- 
ton, with an English fleet and army, designed for the conquest of Canada. 
New England promptly raised additional forces, and on the 10th of August, 
fifteen men-of-war and forty transports, bearing almost seven thousand troops, 
departed for the St. Lawrence to attack Quebec. Walker, like Braddock,' 
haughtily refused to listen to experienced subordinates, and lost eight of his 
ships, and almost a thousand men, on the rocks at the mouth of the river, on 
the night of the 2d of September. Disheartened by this calamity. Walker 
returned to England with the remainder of his fleet, and the colonial troops 
went back to Boston. On hearing of this failure of the naval expedition, a 
body of troops marching from Albany to attack Montreal, retraced their steps.' 
Hostilities were now suspended, and in the spring of 1713, a treaty of peace 
was concluded [April 11] at Utrecht. The eastern Indians sent a flag to Bos- 
ton, and sued for peace ; and at Portsmouth the Governor of Massachusetts and 
New Hampshire entered into a pacific compact [July 24] with the chiefs of the 
tribes. 

A long peace now ensued, and for thirty years succeeding the close of 
'Qiieeji Aline s War, the colonists enjoyed comparative repose. Then, again, 
the selfish strifes of European monarchs awakened the demon of discord, and its 
bloody footsteps were soon apparent along the northern frontiers of the English 
colonies in America. The interim had been a period of much political agitation 
in Massachusetts, during which a great stimulus had been given to the growth 
of republican principles. Disputes, sometimes violent, and sometimes in a con- 
ciliatory spirit, had been carried on between the royal governors and the repre- 
sentatives of the people ; the former contending for prerogatives and salaries 
which the people deemed inadmissible,"* These internal disputes were arrested 
when they heard that France had declared hostility to England [March 15, 
1744], and the colonists cheerfully prepared to commence the contest known in 

America as 

KING GEORGE'S AVAR,^ 

This war was not productive of many stirring events in America. The 
principal and very important one was the capture of the strong fortress of 

' King "William liad no children; and Anne, the daughter of James the Second (who was mar- 
ried to Prince George of Denmark), succeeded him as sovereign of England in 1702. "^ Page 186. 

* These were four thousand in number, under the command of General Nicholson. They were 
furnished by New York and Connecticut. , 

* The chief topic of controversy was the payment of salaries. Governors Shute, Burnet and 
Belcher, all contended for a permanent salary, but the people claimed the right to vote such salary, 
each year, as the services of the governor appeared justly to demand. A compromise was finally 
effected by an agreement to vote a certain sum each year. The subject of salaries was a cause of 
contention with the royal governors, until the Revolution. 

* The husband of Queen Anne died several years previous to her death, which occurred in 
August, 1704. George, Elector of Hanover, in Germany, was immediately proclauned King of 



1755.] 



MASSACHUSETTS. 



137 



Louisburg, on the island of Cape Breton. It had been constructed bj the 
French after the treaty of Utrecht, at an expense of five and a half millions of 
dollars, and because of its strength, was called The Gibraltar of America. 
William Shirley,' a soldier and energetic statesman, was Governor of Massa- 
chusetts when hostilities were proclaimed. He immediately perceived the 
importance of Louisburg in the coming contest, and plans for its capture were 
speedily perfected by the Legislature of jSIassachusetts. - Rhode Island, New 
Hampshire, and Connecticut furnished their proper quota of troops. New 
York sent artillery, and Pennsylvania provisions. Thus common danger was 
extending the idea of a necessity for a union of the Anglo-American colonies, 
long before it assumed a practical form in 1754.^ 

After vainly waiting for some time in the expectation 
of aid from Commodore Warren (then in the West In- 
dies), the colonial forces, thirty-two hundred strong, 
under the general command of William 
Pepperell,' sailed [April 4, 1745] for 
Louisburg.^ At Canseau they were un- 
expectedly joined by the fleet of Warren 
[May 9], and on the 11th of May the 
combined forces, four thousand 
strong, landed at Gabarus Bay, 
a short distance from their des- 
tination. The sudden appear- 
ance of this formidable arm- 
ament, was the first intimation captuee op louisburg in 1745. 
to the French, that an attack 
was meditated, and great consternation prevailed in the fortress and town. A 




England, by the title of George the Fu^t. His son George succeeded him in 1727, and also 
retained the title and privileges of Elector of Hanover. A contest arose between Maria Theresa, 
Empress of Hungary, and the Elector of Bavaria, for the throne of Austria. The King of England 
espoused the cause of the empress, in 1743, and the King of France took part witli her opponent. 
This led France to declare war against England — a contest known in America as King George's 
War, but in Europe, the War of the Austrian Succession. 

' "WiUiam Shirley was born in England ; made governor of Massachusetts in 1 741 ; was after- 
ward made governor of one of the Bahama Islands, and died at Roxbury, near Boston, in 1771. 
He appears conspicuous in history during a portion of the contest known in America as Tlie French 
and Indian War. 

^ Shirley proposed an expedition, but the Legislature hesitated. The measure was finally 
agreed upon by a majority of only one vote. ^ Page 183. 

■* Pepperell was a native of Maine, and a wealthy merchant. He was afterward made a bar- 
onet. He died in 1759. 

* Louisburg is on the east side of the island of Cape Breton, with a fine, deep harbor. The land- 
ing-place of the British, position of the camp, etc., will be seen by reference to the map. The Royal 
Battery was taken hj four hundred men. When they approached, the French thought the whole 
English army was upon them. They immediately spiked their guns (that is, drove iron spikes into 
the touch-holes of the cannons, so as to make them useless), and fled In the upper part of the map 
is a profile of the fortifications at Louisburg. It is given here so as to illustrate certain terms which 
may be used hereafter : a, the glacis, is the extreme outside slope of the works ; h, the banquet, or 
step upon which the soldiers stand to fire over the parapet ; c, a covered way into the fort, under the 
banquet; d, counterscarp, a bank or wall, outside the ditch, e;f, the parapet, a protection for the men 
•and guns from balls from without; g, the inner banquet; h, ramparts — the most solid embankment 
«f the fortress ; i the last slope in the interior of the fort, called talus. 



138 THE COLONIES. [1G20. 

direct approach was difficult on account of a morass, and a combined attack by 
sea and land was carefully arranged. The land forces encamped in a curve in 
rear of the town, and detachments secured the French outposts, one after an- 
other. Cannons were dragged on sledges over the morass, ' trenches were dug, 
1)atteries were erected, and a regular siege was commenced, on the 31st of May. 
In the mean while. Commodore Warren captured a French ship of seventy-four 
guns, and secured, as prisoners, over five hundred men, with a large quantity 
of military stores. While the siege was in progress, other English vessels o ' 
war arrived, and the fleet and army agreed to make a combined attack on ih > 
29th of June. Despairing of successful resistance, the French surrendered the 
fortress, the city of Louisburg, and the island of Cape Breton, on the 28th of 
June, 1745.^ 

The pride of France was greatly mortified by this daring and successful 
expedition, and the following year [1746] the Duke D'Anville was sent with a 
powerful naval armament' to recover the lost fortress, and to desolate the En- 
glish settlements along the seaboard. Storms wrecked many of his vessels, and 
disease soon wasted hundreds of his men ; and D'Anville, thoroughly dispirited, 
abandoned the enterprise without striking a blow.'' Two years afterward a 
treaty of peace was concluded at Aix-la-Chapelle, in western Germany, when 
it was agreed that all prisoners should be released, and all acquisitions of prop- 
erty or territory, made by either party, were to be restored. Both of the 
principal parties were heavy losers by the contest ;5 while the strength of the 
colonists, yet to be called forth in a more important struggle, was revealed aid 
noted. 

Old national animosities, religious differences, and recent causes for irrita- 
tion, had inspired the English and French with intense mutual hatred, when 
the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle was signed on the 18th of October, 1748. The 
allegiance of Massachusetts and its sister colonies to the British crown, and the 
acknowledged duty of obedience, restrained the resentment of the American 
people, while England and France were at peace. Soon, disputes about local 
boundaries began," and it was not long before preparations for war between the 
two races, were visible in America. Then came that final bloody struggle be- 
tween the English and French, for dominion in the New World, known as the 
French and Indian War J This we shall consider hereafter. 



' The artillery was commanded by Richard Gridley, who was tlie engineer of the continent;.! 
army at Boston in 1775 and 17 7G. See page 234. 

* The prizes and stores obtained by the English amounted, in value, to little less than five mi:- 
lions of dollars. 

^ It consisted of forty ships of war, fifty-six transports, thirty-five hundred men, and forty thou- 
sand muskets for the use of the French and Indians in Canada. 

* D'Anville, with two or three vessels, anchored at Chebucto (now Halifax, Nova Scotia), whero 
he died, it is believed, by poison. His lieutenant also committed suicide, in consequence of morti- 
fied pride. These disasters to the French fleet were regarded by the people of New England as spe- 
cial manifestations of Providence in their fiivor. Public thanksgivings were oflered ; and no ona 
doubted the right of the English to the whole of Acadie. 

* Parliament afterward reimbursed to the colonies the cost of their preparations against Canada^ 
amounting to more than a million of dollars. See page 199. 

* Page 180. ' Page 179. 



1756.J NEW YORK. ]39 

CHAPTER III. 

NEW YORK. [162 3.] 

The State of New York commenced its political career when Peter Minuit,' 
recently appointed Governor of New Netherland,* arrived at New Amsterdam 
(as the germ of the present city of New York was called), in May, 1626. He 
immediately purchased of the Indians, for about twenty-four dollars, the whole 
of the island of Manhattan,^ on which the city of New York now stands, and 
began vigorously to perfect the founding of a State similar to those of Holland. 
He erected a strong fortification near the site of the present Battery, and called 
it Fort Amsterdam.* By conciliatory measures, he gained the confidence of 
the Indians ; and he also opened a friendly correspondence with the Puritans at 
Plymouth.^ The English reciprocated the friendly expressions of the Dutch ; 
at the same time, they requested the latter not to send their trappers quite as 
far eastward as Narraganset Bay, to catch otters and beavers.^ 

For the purpose of encouraging emigration to New Netherland, the Dutch 
West India Company'' offered, in 1629, large tracts of land, and certain priv- 
ileges, to those persons who should lead or send a given number of emigrants 
to occupy and till the soil.'^ Directors of the company^ availed themselves of 
the privilege, and sent Wouter (Walter) Van T wilier to examine the country 
and select the lands. Immigrants came ; and then were laid the foundations 
of the most noted of the manorial estates of New York.'" The proprietors were 
called patroons (patrons), and held a high political and social station in the 
New World. 

The agent of the Patroons seems to have performed his duty well, and he 
•was appointed governor of the colony, in 1633. The beginning of Van Twil- 
ler's administration was marked by difficulties with the English on the Con- 



* Page 93. "" Page 72. ' Note 1, page 48. * Soe picture on page 144. * Page 78, 

* Trade in furs was the chief occupation of tlie Dutch of New Netherland at this time. They 
became expert trappers, and were seen as far east as Nantucket, and even Cape Cod. The trade 
soon became profitable to the Company. The first year's remittance of furs to Amsterdam was 
valued at $11,000. This trade greatly increased; and before the troubles with the Indians in 1640, 
the value of furs sent to Holland, annually, was more than $60,000. ' Pao-e 72. 

^ The land was to be fairly purchased of the Indians, and then the title was to bo confirmed by 
the Dutch government. The privileges granted to the purchasers made them, in a degree, feudal 
lords [note 15, page 62l, yet they were exempted fi-pm paying tribute to supreme authority. 

^ Killian Van Rensselaer, who purchased a tract at Fort Orange (Albany) ; Samuel G-odyn and 
Samuel Bloemart, who selected lands in West Jersey, on the Delaware ; and Michael Pauw, whose 
domain included Jersey City and vicinity. See page 94. 

'" Van Rensselaer. A larger portion of the land in Albany and Rensselaer counties, once 
portions of the first Patroon's estates, has passetl out of the possession of the family. ^Vfter 
1840, many scenes of violence and bloodshed were witnessed on those lands, growing out of 
disputes with tenants, when they were called upon to pay even the almost nominal rent which 
was demanded. Social and political questions arose and produced two strong parties. The 
opposition of the tenantry was termed Anti-Rentism. Conciliatory measures were finally 
proposed by a purchaser of a large portion of the ancient manor, in Albany county, by which 
the tenants were allowed to buy the land, and obtain a title in fee-simple. In time, the Avhole 
estate will thus pass into the hands of numerous new owners. These angry disputes have al- 
ready become items of past history. 



140 THE COLONIES, [1623. 

iiecticut River.' He was more distinguished for his marriage connection with 
Van Rensselaer, one of the Patroons, than for any administrative qualities. 
Yet circumstances favored the advancement of the colony, and he ruled quite 
satisfactorily, especially to the company, whose interests he faithfully served. 
He was succeeded in office, in May, 1638, by Sir William Keift, at the mo- 
ment when the Swedish colony'' were seating themselves upon the banks of the 
Delaware. Keift was a bold, rapacious, and unscrupulous man, and soon 
brought serious trouble upon the people. He began a tyrannous rule by con- 
centrating executive power in his own hands ; and his administration was a 
«tormy and unfortunate one. The sum of its record is a tale of continual strife 
with the Swedes on the Delaware,^ the English on the Connecticut, ■*■ the Indiana 
all around him, and the colonists at his door. His difficulties with the Indiana 
proved the most disastrous of all, and finally wrought his own downfall. Pre- 
vious to his arrival, the intercourse of the Dutch with the natives had been 
quite friendly.^ The fur trade was extending, and trappers and traders were 
all abroad among the native tribes. These carried a demon of discord with 
them. They furnished the Indians with mm, and quarrels and murders en- 
sued. The avaricious Keift also demanded tribute of wampum^ and beaver- 
skins fi-om the River tribes ; and in a short time their friendship for the Dutch 
became weakened. 

A crisis came. Some Raritan' Indians in New Jersey were accused of rob- 
bery. Keift sent an armed force to punish them [July, 1640], and blood 
flowed. Several Indians were killed, and their crops were destroyed. Savage 
vengeance did not slumber long. The Raritans murdered four planters on 
Staten Island [June, 1641], and destroyed considerable property.^ An expe- 
dition sent to punish the offenders was unsuccessful. Soon afterward, a young 
Westchester Indian, whose uncle had been murdered by a Hollander, near 
where the Halls of Justice now stand, ^ revenged the murder, according to the 
customs of his people,'" by killing an inoffensive Dutchman living at Turtle 
Bay.'' His tribe refused to surrender him on the demand of Keift, and the 
governor determined to make war upon all the offending savages. 

The people of New Nether land had already begun to murmur at Keift' s 
course, and they charged the troubles with the Indians directly upon him. Un- 
willing to assume the entire responsibility of a war, himself, the governor called 
a meeting [Aug. 23, 1641] of the heads of families in New Amsterdam for 
■consultation. They promptly chose "twelve select men" [August 29], with De 

' Page 85. * Page 93. ' ^ Page 93. * Page 85. 

* The Dut^'h had made a settlement, and built a fort at Albany [page 12], and made a treaty of 
friendship with the Mohawks [page 23]. This the River Indians, in the vicinity of New Amster- 
dam, did not like, for the Mohawks were their oppressors. ° Note 2, page 13. 

' A tribe of the Lenni-Lenapes. Page 16. 

^ This plantation belonged to De Vries [note 2, page 92], who was a friend of the Indians. 

* On Center street. New York city. There was once a fresh-water pond there, surrounded by 
the forest. 

'" The Indians had a custom concerning an avenger of hlood, similar to that of the Jews. It was 
the duty and the privilege for the next of kin to the murdered man, to avenge his blood by killing 
the murderer. The Indians took the life of any of the tribe of the offender. 

" At the foot of Forty-fifth street, on the East River. 



1755.] NEW YORK. 14X 

Vries' at their head, to act for them ; and this was the first representative 
assembly ever formed among Europeans on Manhattan Island. Thej did not 
agree with the governor's hostile views ; and Keift finding them not onlj op- 
posed to his war designs, but that they were also taking cognizance of alleged 
grievances of the people, dissolved them, in February, 1642. Finally, the 
commission of other murders by Indians, and the presence of a body of Mo- 
haAvks, who had come down to exact tribute from the River tribes, concurred 
with the changed opinions of some leading citizens of New Amsterdam, to 
make Keift resolve to embrace this opportunity to chastise the savages. A 
large number of them had fled before the Mohawks, and sought shelter with 
the Hackensacks, near Hoboken, and there craved the protection of the Dutch. 
Now was offered an opportunity for a wise and humane governor to make a 
covenant of peace and friendship ; but Keift could not be satisfied without a 
flow of blood. At midnight, in February, 1643, a body of Hollanders and INIo- 
hawks crossed the Hudson, fell upon the unsuspecting fugitives, and before the 
dawn, they massacred almost a hundred men, women, and children. Many 
were driven from the cliffs at Hoboken into the freezing flood ; and at sunrise 
the bloody marauders returned to New Amsterdam with thirty prisoners, and 
the heads of several Indians. 

The fiery hatred and vengeance of all the surrounding tribes were aroused 
by this massacre, and a fierce war was soon kindled. Villages and farms were 
desolated, and white people were butchered wherever they were found by the 
incensed Indians.* The Long Island tribes,^ hitherto friendly, joined their kin- 
dred, and the very existence of the Dutch colony was menaced. Fortunately 
for the settlers, that eminent peace-maker, Roger Williams,* arrived [1643], to 
embark for England,^ and he pacified the savages, and secured a brief repose for 
the colony. But the war was soon renewed, and for two years the colony suf- 
fered dreadfully. Having no competent leader, they employed Captain John 
Underbill,'^ who successfully beat back and defeated the Indians, and hostilities 
ceased. The Mohawks came and claimed sovereignty over the River Indians, 
made a treat}'- of peace with the Dutch, and the hatchet was buried. 

The conduct of Governor Keift was so offensive to the colonists and the 
Company, that he was recalled, and he sailed for Europe in 1647, in a richly 
laden vessel. It was wrecked on the coast of Wales, and there he perished. 
He had already been succeeded in office [May, 27, 1647], by Peter Stuyvesant, 
lately governor of Cura^oa, a soldier of eminence, and possessed of every requis- 
ite for an efiicient administration of government. His treatment of the Indians 
was very kind and just, and they soon exhibited such friendship for the Dutch, 
that Stuyvesant was falsely charged with a design to employ them in murder- 
ing the English in New England.^ Long accustomed, as a military leader, to 

' Note 2, page 92. 

* It was during this frenzy of revenge that Mrs. Hutchinson, who had been banished from Mas- 
sachusetts, and had taken up her residence near the present New Rochelle, "Westchester County, 
New York, was murdered, with all her family. The stream upon which she lived is yet known as 
Hutchinson's River. ' Page 21. ■* Page 8,7. " Page 91. ® Page 87. 

' See page 121. This idea prevailed, because during almost the entire winter of 1652-3, Ninigret 



142 



THE COLONIES, 



[1623. 



arbitrary rule, he was stern and inflexible, but he had the reputation of an 
honest man. He immediately commenced much needed reforms ; and during 
his whole administration, which was ended bj the subjugation of the Dutch by 
the English,* in 1664, he was the fliithful mid energetic defender of the integ- 




rity of the province against its foes. By prudent management he avoided col- 
lisions Avith the English, and peaceably ended boundary disputes" with them in 
the autumn of 1650. This cause for irritation on his eastern frontier being 
removed, Stuyvesant turned his attention to the growing power of the Swedes, 
on the Delaware. 

Governor Stuyvesant built Fort Casimir, on the site of the present New 



and two other Narragansett sachems had been in New Amsterdam, and on very friendly terms with 
Stuyvesant. These sachems, who were true friends of the English, positively disclaimed all bad 
intentions on the part of Stuyvesant, and yet historians of the present day repeat the slander. 

^ Page 144. 

" See page 85. He went to Hartford, and there made a treaty which fixed the eastern bound- 
ary of New Netherland nearly on the line of the present division between New Tork and Connecti- 
cut, and across Long Island, at Oyster Bay, thirty miles eastward of New York. The Dutch claims 
to lands on the Connecticut River were extinguished by this treaty. From the beginning of diffi- 
culties, the Dutch were clearly iu the right. This was acknowledged by impartial and just New 
Englanders. In a manuscript letter before me, from Edward Winslow to Governor Winthrop, dated 
at "Marshfield, 2d of 6th month, 1644," in which he replies to a charge of being favorable to the 
Dutch, in some respects, he says that he had asserted in substance, that he " would not defend the 
Hartford men's cause, for they had hitherto (or thus long) wronged the Dutch." 



1755.] NEW YORK. 143 

Castle, in Delaware, in 1651. This was soon seized bj the Swedes, and the 
garrison made prisoners. The States-General' resolved to prevent further 
trouble with these enterprising neighbors of the Dutch, and for this purpose, 
gave Stuyvesant full liberty to subjugate the Swedes. At the head of six hu.n- 
dred men, he sailed for the Delaware, in August, 1655, and by the middle of 
October, he had captured all the Swedish fortresses, and sent the governor 
(Risingh) and several other influential men, to Europe. Some of the settlers 
withdrew to Maryland and Virginia, but the great body of them quietly sub- 
mitted, took an oath of allegiance to the States-General of Holland, and con- 
tinued in peaceable possession of their property. Thus, after an existence of 
about seventeen years [1638 — 1655 j, New Sweden- disappeared by absorp- 
tion into New Netherland. 

New trouble now appeared, but it was soon removed. "While Stuyvesant 
and his soldiery were absent on the Delaware, some Indians, who were not yet 
reconciled to the Dutch, menaced New Amsterdam.' The return of the gov- 
ernor produced quiet, for they feared and respected him, and, for eight years, 
the colony was very little disturbed by external causes. Then the Esopus 
Indians suddenly fell upon the Dutch settlements [June, 1663 j at Wiltwyck 
(now Kingston, in Ulster County),^ and killed and captured sixty-five of the in- 
habitants. Stuyvesant promptly sent a sufficient force to chastise them ; and so 
thoroughly was the errand performed, that the Indians sued for peace in ]May, 
1664, and made a treaty of friendship. 

External difficulties gave Stuyvesant little more trouble than a spirit opposed 
to his aristocratic views, which he saw manifested daily around him. While he 
had been judiciously removing all cause for ill-feeling with his neighbors, there 
was a power at work within his own domain which gave him gi-eat uneasiness. 
The democratic seed planted by the Twelve, in Keift's time,^ had begun to grow 
vigorously under the fostering care of a few enlightened Hollanders, and some 
Puritans who had settled in New Netherland. The latter, by their api^lause 
of English institutions, had diffused a desire among the people to partake of the 
blessings of English liberty, as they understood it, and as it appeared in New 
England. Stuyvesant was an aristocrat by birth, education, and pursuit, and 
vehemently opposed every semblance of democracy. At the beginning he found 
himself at variance with the people. At length an assembly of two deputies 
from each village in New Netherland, chosen by the inhabitants, convened at 
New Amsterdam [December, 1653], without the approbation of the governor. 
It was a spontaneous, and, in the eyes of the governor, a revolutionary move- 
ment. Their proceedings displeased him ; and finding argument of no avail, he 
exercised his official prerogative, and commanded obedience to his will. The 
people grew bolder at every rebuff", and finally they not only resisted taxation, 
but openly expressed a willingness to bear English rule for the sake of enjoy inn- 
English liberty. 

The opportunity for a change of rulers was not long delayed. A crisis in 

• Note 1, page 59. » Page 93. ' Page 139. * Page 283. * Pa-o UO. 



144 THE COLONIES. [1623. 

tliG affairs of New Netlierland now approached. Charles the Second, of En- 
gland, -without any fair pretense to title, gave the whole territory of New 
Netherland [March 22, 1664 J to his brother James, Duke of York,' The duk& 
sent an English squadron, under the command of Colonel Richard Nicolls,' to 
secure the gift ; and on the 8d of September, 1664, the red cross of St. George^ 
floated in triumph over the fort, and the name of New Amsterdam was changed 
to New York." It was an easy conquest, for, while the fortifications and other 
means of defense were very weak, the people were not unwilling to try English 
rule. Stuyvesant began to' make concessions to the people, when it was toa 
late, and when his real strength, the popular will, had departed from him. He 
hesitated long before he would sign the articles of capitulation ; and thus, until 
the end, he Avas fliithful to his employers, the Diitch West India Comjoany.^ 
With the capital, the remainder of the province passed into the hands of the 
English ; and early in October, 1664, New Netherland was acknowledged a 
part of the British realm, and Nicolls, the conqueror became governor." Let 
us now consider 

NEW YORK UNDER THE ENGLISH. 

Very soon after the 

conquest the people of 

New York^ perceived 

that a change of masters 

CITY OF NEW YORK IN 1664. did not Guhance their 

prosperity and happiness. 
They were disappointed in their hopes of a representative government ; and 
their taxes, to support a governinont in which they had no voice, were increased. 
Lovelace, the successor of Nicolls, in 1667, increased their burdens ; and when 
they sent a respectful protest to him, he ordered the paper to be burned by 
tlie common hangman. Like a petty tyrant, he declared that the people 
should have " liberty for no thought but how to pay their taxes." But the 
people did think of something else, and were on the eve of open rebellion when 

' Pnge 94. ^ Note 6, pn.j^e 123. 

' Tlie royal standard of England is sometimes so named because it bears a red cross, wliich is 
called the "cross of St. George," the patron saint of Great Britain. After the union with Scotland 
[note 1, page 63], the cross of St. Andrew (in the form of an X), was added, and is now seen on 
the British flag. In the centre are the royal arms. This Union, as the figure is called, was borne 
upon the American flags, sometimes, until after the Leclaration of Independence, in 1776. It was 
upon the flag of thirteen stnpes, alternate red and white, which Washington caused to be unfurled 
at Cambridge, on the first day of that year. See page 245. 

* The name of Fort Orange settlement [note 9, page 139], was changed to Albany, one of the 
duke's titles. * Page 72 

* We have elsewhere noticed the fact, that before Nicolls was dispatched, the duke, being cer- 
tain of victory, sold that part of New Netherland now included in New Jersey, to other parties. 
[See page 94.] Long Island, which had been previously granted to the Earl of Stirling, was pur- 
chased by the Dutch, in total disregard of the claims of Connecticut. The colonies on the Delaware 
remained under the jurisdiction of New York, and were governed by deputies. 

' The above picture is a correct view of the city of New York more than two hundred years ago. 
It is now [1883] the largest city on the American continent. On the left of the picture is seen Fort 
Amsterdam, with the church and Governor's house within it, and a windmill. The point of 
IManhattan Island, from the present Battery Place to the foot of Wall-street, is here seen. 





Stuyvesant Surrf-vdeking tiis Fori- to the English 



1755.] NEW YORK. 147 

-the clouds of national war overshadowed local difficulties. War again com- 
menced between England and Holland in 1672, and in July the following year, 
a Dutch squadron sailed up the Bay of New York, and, in the absence of the 
governor, took possession of the fort and town [August 9th, 1673] without 
giving a shot. The easy conquest was the work of treason ; yet, as the royal 
libertine (Charles the Second) on the throne of England doubtless shared in the 
bribe, the traitor went unpunished. ' New Jersey and the Territories of Dela- 
ware^ yielded, and for sixteen months [from July, 1673, to November, 1674] 
New York was again New Netherlands. When the two nations made a treaty 
of peace, the province was restored to the English, and remained in their pos- 
session until our Independence Avas declared in 1776.^ These changes raised 
some doubts concerning the validity of the duke's title, and the king gave him 
another grant in July, 1674. Sir Edmond Andros* was appointed governor 
under the new charter, and continued arbitrary rule with increased rigor. ^ 

At the close of 1683, Governor Andros returned to England, when the 
duke (who was a Roman Catholic) appointed Thomas Dongan, of the same 
faith, to succeed him. In the mean while, the duke had listened to the judicious 
advice of William Penn, and instructed Dongan to call an assembly of repre- 
sentatives. They met [October 17, 1683], and with the hearty concurrence of 
the governor, a Charter of Liberties was established,* and the permanent 
foundation of a representative government was laid. The people rejoiced in the 
change, and were heartily engaged in the efforts to perfect a wuse and liberal 
government, when the duke was elevated to the throne, as James the Second, 
on the death of Charles, in February, 1685. As king, he refused to confirm 
the privileges which, as duke, he had granted ; and having determined to intro- 
duce the Roman Catholic religion into the province as the established church, 
he commenced by efforts to enslave the people. A direct tax was ordered ; the 
printing press — the right arm of knowledge and freedom — was forbidden a 
place in the colony ; and the provincial offices were filled by Roman Catholics. 
These proceedings gave pain to the liberal-minded Dongan ; and when the king, 
in his religious zeal, instructed the governor to inti-oduce French priests among 
the Five Nations,' he resisted the measure as highly inexpedient.* His firm- 



' The traitor was Captain John Manning, the commandant of the fort. He was, doubtless, 
bribed by the Dutch commander; and the fact that the king screened him from punishment, gave 
the color of truth to the charge that the monarch shared m the bribe- * Page 96. 

' Page 251. " Page 129. 

^ The duke claimed the country from the Connecticut River to Cape Henlopen. Andros 
attempted to exercise authority eastward of the line agreed upon by the Dutch and tlie Connecticut 
people [note 2, page 142], and went to Saybrook in the summer of 1676, with an armed party, to 
enforce the claim. He met with such resistance, that he was compelled to return to New York 
without accomplishing his design. See page 116. 

" The Assembly consisted of the governor and ten councillors, and seventeen deputies elected 
by the freeholders. They adopted a Declaration of Rights, and asserted the principle, so nobly 
fought for a hundred years later, that taxation and representation are inseparable ; in other words — 
that taxes can not be levied without the consent of the people, expressed by their representatives. 
At this time the colony was divided into twelve counties. ' Page 23. 

* This measure would have given ilie French, in Canada, an influence over the Indians that 
might have proved fatal to English power on the Continent. The Five Nations remained the fast 
friends of the EngUsh, and stood as a powerful barrier against the French, when the latter twice 
-invaded the Iroquois territory, in endeavors to reach the English, at Albany. 



148 THE COLONIES. [1623. 

ness gave the people confidence, and they were again on the eve of open rebel- 
lion, when the intelligence of the flight of James, and the accession of William 
and INIary' reached them. They immediately appointed a committee of safety, 
and with almost unanimous voice, sanctioned the conduct of Jacob Leisler (an 
influential merchant and commander of the militia), avIjo had taken possession, 
of the fort in the name of the new sovereigns, and by order of the inhabitants. 
Afraid of the people, Nicholson, the successor of Dongan, fled on board a vessel 
and departed, and the people consented to Leisler' s assuming the functions of 
governor until a new one should be appointed. The aristocracy and the magis- 
trates were ofiended, and denouncing Leisler as a usurper, they accused him 
of treason, when Governor Sloughter arrived, in 1691. 

Leisler, in the mean Avhile, conducted affairs with prudence and energy. 
Having the sanction of the people, he needed no further authority ; and when a 
letter from the British ministers arrived [December, 1689], directed to Gov- 
ernor Nicholson, "or, in his absence, to such as, for the time being," conducted 
affairs, he considered it as fairly addressed to himself. Milborne, his son-in-law, 
acted as his deputy, and was included in the accusations of the magistrates, 
who had now retired to Albany. They held Tort Orange'' until the invasion 
of the French, in February, 1690,^ when they felt the necessity of claiming 
the protection of the government at New York. They then yielded, and 
remained comparatively quiet until the arrival of Richard Ingoldsby, Sloughter' s 
lieutenant, early in 1691. That officer announced the appointment of Henry 
Sloughter as governor; and without producing any credentials of authority, he 
haughtily demanded of Leisler [February 9, 1691] the surrender of the fort. 
Of course Leisler refused compliance ; but as soon as Sloughter arrived [March 
29], he sent a messenger to announce his desire to surrender all authority into 
his hands. Leisler' s enemies had resolved on his destruction; and when he 
came forward to deliver the fort, in person, he and his son-in-law were seized 
and cast into prison. They were tried on a charge of treason, found guilty, 
and condemned to suffer death. Sloughter withheld his signature to their 
death warrant ; but, when made drunk at a dinner party prepared for the pur- 
pose, he put his name to the fatal instrument. Before he became sober, Leisler 
and Milborne were suspended upon a gallows on the verge of Beekman's swamp 
May 26, 1691], where Tammany Hall — fronting on the City Hall Park. New 
York — now stands. These were the proto-martyrs of popular liberty in 
America.* 

Henry Sloughter was a weak and dissolute man, yet he came with an earn- 
est desire to promote the welfare of the colonists. He convened a popular 
assembly, and formed a constitution, which provided for trial by jury, and an 
exemption from taxes, except by the consent of the representatives of the peo- 
ple. Light was thus dawning hopefully upon the province, when delirium 

' Note "7, page 113. ' Note 9, page 139. 

' At this time, Schenectada was desolated. See page 131. 

* Their estates were confiscated ; but after a lapse of several years, and when the violence of 
party spirit had subsided, the property was restored to their families. 



1755.] NEW YORK. 149 

tremens^ at the close of a drunken revel, ended the administration and the life 
of the governor [August 2, 1691], in less than three months after the murder 
of Leisler and Milborne. He was succeeded bj Benjamin Fletcher, a man of 
violent passions, and quite as weak and dissolute, who became the tool of the 
aristocracy, and was hated by the people. Party spirit, engendered by the 
death of Leisler, burned intensely during the whole administration of Fletcher ; 
and at the same time the French and Indians, under the guidance of Frontenac, 
the able Governor of Canada,' were traversing the northern frontiers of the 
province. Fletcher prudently listened to the advice of Major Schuyler," of 
Albany, respecting the Indians; and under his leadership, the English, and 
their unwavering allies, the Five Nations, successfully beat back the foe to 
the St. Lawrence, and so desolated the French settlements in 1692, in the 
vicinity of Lake Champlain,^ that Frontenac was glad to remain quiet at 
Montreal. • 

A better ruler for New York now appeared. The Earl of Bellomont, an 
honest and energetic Irish peer, succeeded Fletcher in 1698 ; and the following 
year. New Hampshire* and Massachusetts* were placed under his jurisdiction. 
He commenced reform with great earnestness, and made vigorous efforts to sup- 
press piracy," which had become a fearful scourge to the infant commerce of 
the colonists. With Robert Livingston' and others, he fitted out an expedition 
under the famous Captain Kidd, to destroy the buccaneers. Kidd, himself, was 
afterward hung for piracy [1701], and the governor and his sons were charged 
with a participation in his guilt. At any rate, there can be little doubt that 
wealthy men in the colony expected a share in the plunder, and that Kidd, as a 
scape-goat for the sins of the others, avjis the victim of a political conspiracy.* 

Unfortunately for the colony, death removed Bellomont, on the 16th of 
March, 1701, when his liberal policy was about to bear fruit. He was suc- 
ceeded by Edward Hyde (afterward Lord Cornbury),' a libertine and a knave, 
who cursed the province with misrule for seven years. He was a bigot, too, 
and persecuted all denominations of Christians, except those of the Church of 
England. He embezzled the public moneys, involved himself in heavy debts, 
and on all occasions was the practical enemy of popular freedom. The people 

' From 1678 to 1682, and again from 1689 to 1698, when he died, at the age of 77. 

"^ Peter Schuyler. He was mayor of Albany, and acqtoired unbounded influence over the Five 
Nations of Indians. See page 23. 

^ Schuyler's force was about three hundred Mohawks, and as many English. They slew about 
three hundred of the French and Indians, at the north end of the lake. * Page 79. * Pao-e 117 

" Because Spain claimed the exclusive right to the West India seas, her commerce in that°region 
Tvas regarded as fair plunder. Privateer commissions were readily granted by the English, French, 
and Dutch governments ; and daring spirits from all countries were found under their flags. The 
buccaneers, as they were called, became very numerous and powerful, and at length depredated 
upon English commerce as well as Spanish. Privateers, or those legally authorized to seize the prop- 
erty of an enemy, became pirates, or sea robbers. Privateering is only legalized piracy. 

' An immigrant from Scotland, and ancestor of the Livingston family in this country. He was 
connected, by marriage, with the Van Rensselaer and Schuyler families; and in 1685, he received 
from governor Doagan a grant of a feudal prmcipality (see patroon, page 139) on the Hudson, yet 
known as Livingston's Manor. 

* King William himself was a shareholder in the enterprise for which Kidd was fitted out. Kidd 
appeared publicly in Boston, where he was arrested, then sent to England, tried, and executed. 

» Page 161. 



150 THE COLONIES. [1623-. 

finally demanded and obtained his recall, and the moment his official career 
ceased, in 1708, his creditors cast him into prison, where he remained until his 
accession to the peerage, on the death of his father.' From this period until 
the arrival of "William Cosby, as governor [1732], the royal representatives,^ 
unable to resist the Avill of the people, as expressed by the Assembly, allowed, 
democratic principles to grow and bear fruit.^ 

The popular will and voice now began to be potential in the administration 
of public affairs. Rip Van Dam, "a man of the people," was acting governor 
when Cosby came. They soon quarreled, and two violent parties arose — the 
democratic, which sided with Van Dam, and the aristocratic, which supported 
the governor. Each party had the control of a newspaper," and the Avar of 
words raged violently for a long time. The governor, unable to compete with 
his opponent, finally ordered the arrest of Zenger [November, 1734], the pub- 
lisher of the democratic paper, on a charge of libel. After an imprisonment of 
thirty-five weeks, Zenger was tried by a jury, and acquitted, in July, 1735. 
He was defended by Andrew Hamilton, of Philadelphia, who was presented by 
the magistrates of the city of New York with a gold box, as a token of their 
esteem for his noble advocacy of popular rights. Then was distinctly drawn 
the line of demarcation between republicans and royalists (Whigs and Tories),' 
which continued prominent until the war of the revolution was ended in 1783. 

From the arrival of Cosby until the commencement of the French and 
Indian war," the history of New York is composed chiefly of the records of 
party strife, and presents very little matter of interest to the general reader. 
Only one episode demands special attention, namely, the excitement and results 
incident to a supposed conspiracy of the negroes, in 1741, to burn and plunder 
the city, murder the inhabitants, and set up a government under a man of their 
own color. Several incendiary fires had occurred in rapid succession, and a 
house had been robbed by some slaves. The idea of a regular and horrid con- 
spiracy at once prevailed, and, as in the case of the Salem Witchcraft,'' an 
intense panic pervadejjl all classes, and many innocent persons suffered. ^ This- 
is known in history as The Negro Plot. 



' According to an unjust law of England, a peer of the realm (who is consequently a member 
of the House of Lords [note 2, page 218]) can not be arrested for debt. Tliis law, enacted in th© 
reign of Henry the Eighth, still prevails. 

* Lord Lovelace, Ingoldsby, Hunter, Schuyler, Burnet, and Montgomerie. 

' "We have already noticed (page 135) the breaking out of Queen Anne's War, in 1702, and thw 
successful expeditions fitted out and sent in the direction of Montreal in 1709 and 1711. The debt 
which these expeditions laid upon New York, was felt for many years. 

* The New York Weekly Journal (democratic), by John Peter Zenger; The New York Gazette 
(aristocratic), by William Bradford. The latter owned the first press ever set up in the province. 
He commenced printing in New York in 1696. See note 3, page 179. 

" Note 4, page 226. ' Page 179. ' Page 132. 

* Before the panic was allayed, four white people were hanged; and eleven negroes wera 
burned, eighteen were hanged, and fifty were sent to the West Indies and sold. 



1755.] . MARYLAND 151 

CHAPTER IV. 

MARYLAND. [163 9.] 

When the first popular assembly convened at St. Mary, for legislative pur- 
poses, on the 8th of March, 1635,^ Maryland had then its colonial birth. Its 
sturdy growth began when, in 1639, the more convenient form of representa- 
tive government was established. It was crude, but it possessed the elements 
of republicanism. The freemen chose as many representatives as they pleased, 
and others were appointed by the proprietor. These, with the governor and 
secretary, composed the legislature. At this first session a Declaration of 
Rights was adopted, the powers of the governor were defined, and all the privi- 
leges enjoyed by English subjects were guarantied to the colonists.'' 

Very soon the Indians in the vicinity, becoming jealous of the increasing 
strength of the white people, began to evince hostility. Frequent collisions 
occurred ; and in 1642, a general Indian war commenced in the region between 
the Potomac and the Chesapeake. It Was terminated in 1645, but the quiet 
of the province was soon disturbed again. Clayborne had returned from 
England' [1645], and speedily fanned the embers of discontent into a flame of 
open rebellion. He became too powerful for the local authorities, and Governor 
Calvert^ was obliged to flee to Virginia. During a year and a half, the insur- 
gents held the reins of government, and the horrors of civil war brooded over 
the colony. The rebellion was suppressed in the summer of 1647, and in 
August, Calvert resumed his office. 

In the year 1649, a very important law, known as The Toleration Act, was 
passed by the Assembly. Religious freedom was guarantied by the charter,* 
yet, as much animosity existed between the Protestants' and Roman Catholics, 
the Assembly' thought proper to give the principle the solemn sanction of law. 
By that act every professed believer in Jesus Christ and the Trinity, was 
allowed free exercise of his religious opinions, and no man was permitted to 
reproach another on account of his peculiar doctrines, except under the penalty 
of a fine, to be paid to the person so insulted. Thither persecuted Churchmen 
of New England, and oppressed Puritans of Virginia, fled and found an asylum. 
This act, short of full toleration as it was (for it placed Unitarians beyond the 
pale of its defense), is the pride and glory of the early legislature of Maryland ; 
yet it was not the first instance in America, as is often alleged, when religious 
toleration received the sanction of law.* Rhode Island has that honor. 

' Page 82. " Page 82. " Note 1, page 82. 

* Page 81. * Page 81. ' Note 14, page liJ. 

' Bozman, in his History of Maryland (II. 350 — 356), maintains that the majority of the mena- 
bers of the Assembly of 1649, were Protestants. The records of Maryland prove it. 

"* In May, 1647, the General Assembly of Rhode Island, convened at Portsmouth, adopted a 
code of laws which closed with the declaration that "all men might walk as their consciences per- 
suaded them, without molestation — every one in the name of his God." This was broader tolera- 
tion than the Maryland act contemplated, for it did not restrict men to a belief in Jesus Clmst. 



152 THE COLONIES. [1639. 

Being favored by events in the mother country, republicanism grew steadily 
in the new State. Royalty was abolished in England [1649 J, and for more 
than ten years the democratic idea was prevalent throughout the realm. Lord 
Baltimore, the proprietor of Maryland, professed republicanism on the death of 
the king, but he had been too recently a royalist to secure the confidence of 
Parliament. Stone, his lieutenant, was removed from office [April 16, 1651] 
by commissioners (of whom Clayborne was one), who were sent to administer the 
government of the colony. He was soon afterward [July 8] restored. On the 
dissolution of the Long Parliament [1653J' Cromwell restored full power to the 
proprietor, but the commissioners, who withdrew to Virginia, returned soon 
afterward, and compelled Stone to surrender the government into their hands. 

The colonial government had been re-organized in the mean while. The 
legislative body was divided into an Upper and Lower House in 1650 ; the 
former consisting of the governor and his council, appointed by the proprietor, 
and the latter of representatives chosen by the people. At the same session a 
law was passed prohibiting all taxes, unless levied with the consent of the free- 
men. Political questions were freely discussed by the people ; and soon the 
two chief religious sects were marshaled in opposition, as prime elements of 
political parties. So great had been the influx of Protestants, that they now 
[1654] outnumbered the Roman Catholics as voters and in the Assembly. They 
acknowledged the authority of Cromwell, and boldly questioned the rights and 
privileges of an hereditary proprietor.^ The Roman Catholics adhered to Lord 
Baltimore, and bitter religious hatred was fostered. The Protestants finally 
disfranchised their opponents, excluded them from the Assembly, and in Novem- 
ber, 1654, passed an act declaring Roman Catholics not entitled to the protec- 
tion of the laws of Maryland. 

This unchristian and unwise act of the Protestant party, was a great wrong 
as well as a great mistake. Civil war ensued. Stone returned to St. Mary,* 
organized an armed force composed chiefly of Roman Catholics, seized the colo- 
nial records, and assumed the office of governor. Skirmishes followed, and 
finally a severe battle was fought [April 4, 1655] not far from the site of 
Annapolis, in which Stone's party was defeated, with a loss of about fifty men, 
killed and Avounded. Stone was made prisoner, but his life was spared. Four 
other leading supporters of the proprietor were tried for treason and executed. 
Anarchy prevailed in the province for many months, when the discordant ele- 
ments were brought into comparative order by the appointment of Josiah Fen- 
dall [July 20, 1656] as governor. He was suspected of favoring the Roman 
Catholics, and Avas soon arrested by order of the Protestant Assembly. For 
two years bitter strife continued between the people and the agents of the 

' Wlien Charles the First was beheaded [note 3, pa^e 108], the Parliament assumed supreme 
authority, and remained in permanent session. Cromwell, with an army at his back, entered that 
assembly in the autumn of 1653, ordered them to disperse, and assumed supreme power himselfj 
under the title of Lord Protector. That British legislature is known in history as the Long Parliar 
ment. 

^ According to the original charter, the heirs and successors of Lord Baltimore were to be pro- 
prietors forever. ' Page 82. 



1755.] MARYLAND. 153 

proprietor, when, after concessions by the latter, Fendall was acknowledged 
governor, on the 3d of April, 1658. His prudence secured the confidence of 
the people, but the death of Cromwell, in September, 1658, presaging a change 
in the English government, gave them uneasiness. After long deliberation, 
the Assembly determined to avoid all further trouble with the proprietor, by 
asserting the supreme authority of the people. They accordingly dissolved the 
Upper House [March 24, 1660],' and assumed the whole legislative power of 
the State. They then gave Fendall a commission as governor for the people. 

The restoration of monarchy in England took place in June, 1660,"^ and the 
original order of things w^as re-established in Maryland. Lord Baltimore, hav- 
ing assured the new king that his republican professions' were only temporary 
expedients, was restored to all his proprietary rights, by Charles. Fendall was 
tried, and found guilty of treason, because he accepted a commission from the 
rebellious Assembly. Baltimore, however, wisely proclaimed a general pardon 
for all political oftenders in Maryland ; and for almost thirty years afterward, 
the province enjoyed repose. A law, which established absolute political equal- 
ity among professed Christians, was enacted ; and after the death of the second 
Lord Baltimore [Dec. 10, 1675], his son and successor confirmed it. Under 
that new proprietor, Charles Calvert, Maryland was governed mildly and pru- 
dently, and the people were prospering in their political quietude, when the 
Revolution in England* shook the colonies. The deputy governor of Maryland 
hesitated to proclaim William and Mary,^ and this was made a pretense, by a 
restless spirit, named Coode,^ for exciting the people. He gave currency to the 
absurd report that the local magistrates and the Roman Catholics had leagued 
with the Indians' for the destruction of all the Protestants in the colony. A 
similar actual coalition of Jesuits'* and savages on the New England frontiers^ 
gave a coloring of truth to the story, anA the old religious feud instantly burned 
again intensely. The Protestants formed an armed association [Sept., 1689], 
and led on by Coode, they took forcible possession of St. Mary, and by capitu- 
lation, received the provincial records and assumed the government. They 
called a Convention, and invested it Avith legislative powers. Its first acts were 
to depose the third Lord Baltimore, and to re-assert the sovereign majesty of 
the people. 

Public afiairs were managed by the Convention until 1691, when the king 
unjustly deprived Baltimore of all his political privileges as proprietor [June 
11], and made Maryland a royal province.'" Lionel Copley was appointed the 
first royal governor, in 1692. New laws were instituted — religious toleration 



' Page 152. ' Note 2, page 109. ' Page 152. * Note 7, page 11.3. ^ Page 113. 

* Coode had been a confederate in a former insurrection, but escaped conviction. 

^ A treaty with the Indians liad just been renewed, and the customary presents distributed 
among them. These things Coode falsely adduced as evidences of a coalition with the savages. 

" Note 5, page 130. 9 Page 130. 

'° King William had an exalted idea of royal prerogatives, and was as much disposed as the 
Stuarts (the kings of England from James the Fir.st to James the Second) to suppress democracy in 
the colonies. He repeatedly vetoed (refused his assent) to Bills of Rights enacted by the colonial 
Assemblies ; refused his assent to local laws of the deepest interest to the colonists ; and instructed 
his governors to prohibit printing in the colonies. Note 7, page 112. 



-^(^^ THE COLOXIES. [1639. 

■was abolislicd — the Church of England Avas made the established religion, to be- 
supported by a tax on the people ; and in the State founded by Roman Cath- 
olics, the members of that denomination Avere cruelly disfranchised, with the 
consent of their sovereign. A few years later [1716], the proprietary rights 
of Lord Baltimore (now deceased) were restored to his infant heir, and the 
original form of government was re-established. Such continued to be the poli- 
tical complexion of the colony, until the storm of the Revolution in 1776, swept 
away every remnant of royalty and feudalism, and the State of Maryland was 
established. 



CHAPTER Y. 

CONNECTICUT. [1639.] 

TiiE Connecticut Colony* formed a political Constitution on the 24th of 
January, 1639, and in June following, the New Haven Colony performed 
the same important act.' The religious element was supreme in the new organ- 
ization : and, in imitation of the Constitution of the Plymouth settlers, non& 
but church members were allowed the privileges of freemen' at New Haven. 
They first appointed a committee of twelve men, Avho selected seven of their 
members to be " pillars" in the ncAV State. These had power to admit as many 
others, as confederate legislators, as they pleased. Theophilus Eaton was 
chosen governor,* and the Bible was made the grand statute-book of the colony. 
Many of the New Haven settlers being merchants, they sought to found a com- 
mercial colony, but heavy losses by th* wreck of vessels' discouraged them, and 
they turned their special attention to agriculture. Prudence marked the course 
of the magistrates of the several colonies in the Connecticut valley," and they 
were blessed with prosperity. But difiiculties with the Dutch respecting terri- 
torial boundaries,' and menaces of the neighboring Indians, gave them uneasi- 
ness, and made them readily join the New England confederation in 1643.* 
The following year the little independent colony at Saybrook" j)urchased the 
land of one of the proprietors of Connecticut,*" and became permanently annexed 
to that at Hartford." 

The future appeared serene and promising. The treaty made with Gov- 
ernor Stuyvesant, at Hartford, in 1650,'^ gave token of future tranquillity. But 
the repose was soon broken by international war. England and Holland drew 
the sword against each other in 1652 ; and because it was reported that Nini- 
gret, the wily sachem of the Narragansetts,** had spent several weeks at New 

' Page 89. "^ Pago 89. The people assembled in a barn to form a new Constitution. 

" Note 5, page 118. 

* He was annually chosen to fill the office, until his death, which occurred in 165". 

* In 1647, a new ship belonging to the colony foundered at sea. It was laden with a valuable 
cargo, and the passengers belonged to some of the leading families in the colony. 

« Page 86. ' Page 85, and note 2, page 142. * Page 121. » Page S6. 

* Page 85. " Page 88. " Note 2, page 142. »^ Note 7, page 14L 



1755.] CONNECTICUT. I55 

Amsterdam in the winter of 1652-3' tlie belief prevailed in New England, as 
we have already observed, that Stuy vesant was leaguing with the Indians for 
the destruction of the English.- Great excitement ensued, and a majority of 
the commissioners decided, ^ in 1653, upon war with the Dutch. Immediate 
hostilities were prevented by the refusal of Massachusetts to furnish its quota 
of supplies. The Connecticut colonies (who were more exposed to blows from 
the Dutch than any other) applied to Cromwell for aid, and he sent four ships 
of war for the purpose. Before their arrival," a treaty of peace was concluded 
between the two nations, and blood and treasure were saved. The Assembly 
at Hartford took possession of all property then claimed by the Dutch ; and 
after that the latter abandoned all claims to possessions in the Connecticut 
valley. 

On the restoration of Charles the Second, in 1660, the Connecticut colony 
expressed its loyalty, and obtained a charter. At first, Charles was disposed 
to refuse the application of Winthrop,* the agent of the colony, for he had 
heard of the sturdy republicanism of the petitioners. But when Winthrop 
presented his majesty with a ring Avhich Charles I. liad gi\ en to his grand- 
father, the heart of the king was touched, and he granted a charter [May 30,. 
1662] which not only confirmed the popular Constitution of the colony, but 
contained more liberal provisions than any yet issued from the royal hand." It 
defined the eastern boundary of the province to be Narraganset Bay, and the 
western, the Pacific Ocean. It thus included a portion of Rhode Island, and 
the whole New Haven Colony.^ The latter gave a reluctant consent to the 
union in 1665, but Rhode Island positively refused the alliance. A charter 
given to the latter the year after one was given to Connecticut [1663],* covered 
a portion of the Connecticut grant in Narraganset Bay. Concerning this 
boundary the two colonies disputed for more than sixty years. 

The colony of Connecticut suffered but little during King Philip's Wae,» 
which broke out in 1675, wi'Ji the exception of some settlements high up on 
the fresh water river.'" Yet it furnished its full quota of men and supplies, and 
its soldiers bore a conspicuous part in giving the vigorous blows which broke 
the power of the New England Indians." At the same time, the colonists 
were obliged to defend their liberties against the attempted usurpations of Ed- 
mund Andros, then governor of New York.''' He claimed jurisdiction to the 

» This report was set afloat by Uneas, the mischievous Mohegan sachem [page 87], who hated 
the Narragansetts. It had no foundation in truth. See, also, page 21. 

' Page 141 3 pj^^g 121. 

* Roger Williams, then in England, managed to delay the sailing of the fleet, and thus, again, 
that eminent peace-maker prevented bloodshed. Page 87. 

. ' John Winthrop, son of Governor Winthrop, of Massachusetts. He was chosen governor of 
Connecticut in 1657, and held the office several years. Such was his station when he appeared in 
England to ask a charter of the king. Hopkins (who was one of the founders of the New Haven 
colony) was chosen the first governor of the Connecticut colony, and for several years he and 
Haynes were alternately chosen chief magistrates. 

° This original charter is now [1883] in the office of the Secretary of the State of Connecticut. It 
contains a portrait of Charles the Second, handsomely drawm in India ink, and forming part of an 
Initial letter. This was the instrument afterward hidden in the great oak mentioned on the next p;ige. 
' Page 88. Thus the several settlements were united under the general name of Connecticut 

• Page 156. " Page 124. '» Page 85. » Page 22. " Page 147. 



•^^Q THE COLONIES. [1639. 

mouth of the Connecticut River, and in July, 1675, he proceeded to Saybrook 
with a small naval force, to assert his authority. He was permitted to land ; 
but when he ordered the garrison in the fort to surrender, and began to read his 
commission to the people. Captain Bull, the commander, ordered him to be 
silent. Perceiving the strength and determination of his adversary, Andros 
wisely withdrew, and greatly irritated, returned to New York. 

During the next dozen years, very little occurred to disturb the quiet and 
prosperity of Connecticut. Then a most exciting scene took place at Hartford, 
in which the liberties of the colony were periled. Edmund Andros again ap- 
peared as a usurper of authority. He had been appointed governor of New 
England in 1686,' and on his arrival he demanded a surrender of the charters 
of all the provinces. They all complied, except Connecticut. She steadily 
refused to give up the guaranty of her political rights ; and finally Andros pro- 
ceeded to Hartford with sixty armed men, to enforce obedience. The Assem- 
bly were in session when he arrived [Oct. 31, 1687], and received him court- 
eously. He demanded the surrender of the charter, and declared the colonial 
government dissolved. Already a plan had been arranged for securing the safety 
of that precious instrument, and at the same time to preserve an appearance of 
loyalty. The debates were purposely protracted until the candles were lighted, 
at evening, when the charter was brought in and laid 
upon the table. Just as Andi'os stepped forward to 
take it, the candles were suddenly extinguished. The 
charter was seized by Captain Wadsworth, of the mil- 
itia, and under cover of the night it was effectually 
concealed in the hollow trunk of a huge oak, standing 
not far from the Assembly chamber.' When tlie can- 
dles were relighted, the members were in perfect 
order, but the charter could not be found. Andros 
was highly incensed at being thus foiled, but he 
wisely restrained his passion, assumed the government, and with his own hand 
wrote the word Finis after the last record of the Charter Assembly. The gov- 
ernment was administered in his own name until he was driven from Boston in 
1689,' when the charter was taken from the oak [May 19, 1689J, a popular 
Assembly Avas convened, Robert Treat was chosen governor, and Connecticut 
again assumed her position as an independent colony. 

Petty tyrants continued to molest. A little more than foilr years later, the 
Connecticut people were again compelled to assert their chartered liberties. 
Colonel Fletcher, then governor of New York,^ held a commission which gave 
him command of the militia of Connecticut.^ As that power was reserved to 

- Page 129. 

' That tree remained vigorous until ten minutes before one o'clock in the morning, August 21, 
1856, when it was prostrated during a heavy storm, and nothing but a .«*^ump remains. It stood 
on the south side of Charter-street, a few rods from Main-street, in the city of Hartford. The cavity 
in which the charter was concealed, had become partially closed. 

» Pnge 130. _ ■* Page 147. 

^ Tlie .declared object of this commission was to enable Fletcher to call forth *:he Connecticut 
militia wlicii proper, to repel an expected invasion of Northern New York, by the French and 
Indians. 




THE CHARTER OAK. 



1755.] RHODE ISLAND. 157 

the colony by the charter, the Legislature refused to acknowledge Fletcher's 
authority. In November, 1693, he repaired to Hartford, and, notwithstanding 
the Legislature was in session, and again promptly denied his jurisdiction, he 
ordered the militia to assemble. The Hartford companies, under Captain 
Wadsworth,' were drawn up in line ; but the moment Fletcher attempted to 
read his commission, the drums were beaten. His angry order of " Silence!" 
was obeyed for a moment ; but when he repeated it, Wadsworth boldly stepped 
in front of him, and said, " Sir, if they are again interrupted, I '11 make the sun 
shine through you in a moment." Fletcher perceived the futility of a parley, 
or further assumption of authority ; and, pocketing his commission, he and his 
attendants returned to New York, greatly chagrined and irritated. The mat- 
ter was compromised when referred to the king, who gave the governor of Con- 
necticut militia jurisdiction in time of peace, but in the event of war, Colonel 
Fletcher should have the command of a certain portion of the troops of that 
colony. 

And now, in the year 1700, Connecticut had a population of about thirty 
thousand, which rapidly increased during the remainder of her colonial career. 
During Queen Anne^s Wai\'^ and the stirring events in America from that 
time until the commencement of the French and Indian War,' when her people 
numbered one hundred thousand, Connecticut went hand in hand with her sis- 
ter colonies for mutual welfare ; and her history is too closely interwoven with 
theirs to require further separate notice. 



CHAPTER YI . 

RHODE ISLAND. [1644.] 

When the Providence and Rhode Island plantations were united under 
the same government in 1644, the colony of Rhode Island commenced its inde- 
pendent career." That charter was confirmed by the Long Parliament^ in 
October, 1652, and this put an end to the persevering efforts of Massachusetts 
to absorb " Williams's Narraganset Plantation." That colony had always 
coveted the beautiful Aquiday,* and feared the reaction of Williams's tolerant 
principles upon the people from whose bosom he had been cruelly expelled.'' A 
dispute concerning the eastern boundary of Rhode Island was productive of 
much ill feeling during the progress of a century, when, in 1741, commission- 
ers decided the present line to be the proper division, and wrangling ceased. 

' Page 156. « Page 135. « Page 179. 

* Page 91. A general assembly of deputies from the several towns, met at Portsmouth on the 
29th of May, 1647, and organized the new government by the election of a president and other offi- 
cers. At that time a code of laws was adopted, which declared the government to be a democracy, 
and that "all men might walk as their conscience persuaded them." Page 151. 

' Note 1, page ISG * Note 5, page 91. '' Page 91. 



158 TSE COLONIES. [1644. 

Nor was Rhode Island free from those internal commotions, growing out of relig- 
ious disputes and personal ambition, Avhich disturbed the repose of other colonies. 
These Avere quieted toward the close of 1653, when Roger Williams was chosen 
president. Cromwell confirmed the royal charter on the 22d of May, 1655, 
and during his administration the colony prospered. On the accession of 
Charles the Second,' Rhode Island applied for and obtained a new charter 
[July 8, 1663], highly democratic in its general features, and similar, in every 
respect, to the one granted to Connecticut.^ The first governor elected under 
this instrument, Avas Benedict Arnold ; =* and by a colonial law, enacted during 
his first administration, the privileges of freemen were granted only to free- 
holders and their eldest sons. 

Bowing to the mandates of royal authority, Rhode Island yielded to Andros, 
in January, 1687 ; but the moment intelligence reached the people of the acces- 
sion of William and Mary* [May 11, 1689], and the imprisonment of the petty 
tyrant at Boston,^ they assembled at Newport, resumed their old charter, and 
re-adopted their seal — an michoi\ with Hope for a motto. Under this charter, 
Rhode Island continued to be governed for one hundred and -fifty-three years, 
when the people, in representative convention, in 1842, adopted a constitution.* 
Newport soon became a thriving commercial town ; and^Avhen, in 1732, John 
Franklin established there the first newspaper in the colony, it contained five 
thousand inhabitants, and the whole province about eighteen thousand.' Near 
Newport the celebrated Dean Berkeley purchased lands in 1729; and with 
him came John Smibert, an artist, who introduced portrait painting into Amer- 
ica.* Notwithstanding Rhode Island was excluded from the Ncav England 
confederacy," it always bore its share in defensive efibrts ; and its history is 
identified with that of New England in general, from the commencement of 
King William's War." 

' Page 109. 

" Page 154. This charter guarantied free toleration in religious matters, and the legislature of 
the colony re-asscrted the principle, so as to give it the popular force of law. The assertion, made 
by some, that Roman CathoUcs were excluded from votmg, and that Quakers were outlawed, is 
erroneous. 

^ He was governor several times, serving in that ofBce, altogether, about eleven years. He was 
chief magistrate of the colony when he died, in 1678. * Page 130. 

" Page 130. * Page 477. 

' Of these, about one thousand were Indians, and more than sixteen hundred were negroes. 

* Berkeley preached occasionally in a small Episcopal church at Newport, and presented the 
congregation with an organ, the first ever heard in America. Smibert was a Scotchman, and 
married and settled at Boston. His picture of Berkeley and his family is still preserved at Tale 
College [page 178], in New Haven. Berkeley (afterward made bishop of a diocese in Ireland) made 
great efforts toward the establishment of the Arts and Learning, in America. Failing in his project 
of founding a new University, he became one of the most liberal benefactors of Yale College. In 
view of the future progress of the colonies, he wrote that prophetic poem, the last verse of which. 
contains the oft-quoted line — 

"AYestward the course of Empire takes its way." 

* Page 121. *» Page 130. 



1755.] NEW JERSEY. 150 

CHAPTER YII. 

NEW JERSEY. [1GG4.] 

The settlements in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware, wo have 
considered together in the same chapter,' as constituting a series of events hav- 
ing intimate relations with each other. The history of the colonial organization 
of the first two, is separate and distinct. Delaware was never an independent 
colony or State, until after the Declaration of Independence, in 1776. The 
founding of the New Jersey colony occurred when, in 1664, the Duke of York 
sold the territory to Lord Berkeley and Sir George Carteret,^ and the new 
proprietors began the Avork of erecting a State. They published a form of 
agreement which they called " Concessions,"^ in which liberal offers were made 
to emigrants who might settle within the territory. Among other provisions, 
the people Avere to be exempt from the payment of quit-rents and other burdens, 
for the space of five years. Allured by the liberality of the " Concessions," as 
well as by the salubrity of the climate and the fertility of the soil, many families 
came from Long Island in 1664, and settled at Elizabethtown ;* and in August, 
the following year, Philip Carteret (l^rother of one of the proprietors) was 
appointed governor, and arrived at Elizabethtown with a number of settlers. 

At first all was peaceable. Nothing disturbed the repose of the colony 
during the five years' exemption from rents ; but when, in 1670, the specified 
halfpenny, for the use of each acre of land, was required, murmurs of discon- 
tent were loud and universal. Those who had purchased land from the Indians, 
denied the right of the proprietors to demand rent from them ; and some of the 
towns had even denied the authority of the Assembly, at its first sitting, in 
1668. The whole people combined in resisting the payment of quit-rents; 
and after disputing with the proprietors almost two years, they revolted, called 
a new Assembly, appointed a dissolute, illegitimate son of Sir George Carteret, 
governor, in May, 1672, and in July following, compelled Philip Carteret to 
leave the province. Preparations were in progress to coerce the people into 
submission, when New Jersey, and all other portions of the territory claimed 
by the Duke of York, fell into the hands of the Dutch,^ in August, 1673. On 
the restoration of the territory to the English,® in November, 1674, the Duke 
of York procured a new charter,' and then, regardless of the rights of Berkeley 
and Carteret, he appointed Edmund Andros, "the tyrant of New England," " 

' Page 92. 

' Page 94. The province was called New Jersey, in honor of Carteret, who was governor of 
the island of Jersey, in the British Channel, during the civil war. He was a staunch royalist, and 
was the last commander to lower the royal flag, wlien the Parliament had triumphed. 

^ This was a sort of constitution, which provided for a government to be composed of a governor 
and council appointed by the proprietors, and an Assembly chosen by the freeholders of the prov- 
ince. The legislative power resided in the Assembly; the executive in the governor. The Council 
and the Assembly were each restricted to twelve members. 

* So called, in honor of Elizabeth, wife of Sir George Carteret. 

* Page 147. ^ Page 147. ' Page 147. • Pago 130. 



160 THE COLOXIES. [1664. 

governor of the whole domain. Carteret demurred, and the duke partially 
restored his rights ; not, ho^vever, -without leaving Andros a sufficient pretenso 
for asserting his authority, and producing annoyances. Berkeley had become 
disn-usted, and sold his interest in the province [March 28, 1674] to Edward 
Byllinge, an English Quaker. Pecuniai-y embarrassment caused Byllinge to 
assign his interest to William Penn, and two others,' in 1675. These purchas- 
ers, unwilling to maintain a political union wuth other parties, successfully 
neo-otiated with Carteret for a division of the province, which took place on the 
11th of July, 1676. Carteret received the eastern portion as his share, and 
the Quakers the western part. From that time the divisions were known as 
East and West Jersey. 

The West Jersey proprietors gave the people a remarkably liberal consti- 
tution of government [March 13, 1677] ; and in 1677, more than four hundred 
Quakers came from England and settled below the Raritan. Andros required 
them to acknowledge the authority of the Duke of York. They refused ; and 
the matter was referred to the eminent Sir William Jones (the oriental scholar) 
for adjudication, who decided against the claims of the duke. The latter sub- 
mitlcd to the decision, released both provinces from allegiance to him, and the 
jERi:"EYt5 became independent of foreign control. The first popular assembly 
in West Jersey met at Salem, in November, 1681, and adopted a code of laws 
for the government of the people.' 

Soon after the death of Carteret, in December, 1679, the trustees of his 
estate offered East Jersey for sale. It Avas purchased by William Penn and 
eleven of his brethren, on the 11th of February, 1682, who obtained a new 
charter, and on the 27th of July, 1683, appointed Robert Barclay,^ a very 
eminent Quaker preacher, from Aberdeen, governor for life. A large number 
of his sect came from Scotland and England ; and others from New England 
aha Long Island settled in East Jersey to enjoy prosperity and repose. But 
repose, as well as the administration of Barclay, was of short duration,; for 
when James succeeded Charles,* he appeared to consider his contracts made 
while duke, not binding upon bis honor as kbig. He sought to annul the 
American charters, and succeeded, as we have seen, in subverting the govern- 
ments of several,^ through the instrumentality of Andros. The Jerseys were 
sufferers in this respect, and were obliged to bow to the tyrant. When he was 
driven from the country in 1689,® the provinces were left without regular gov- 
ernments, and for more than twelve years anarchy prevailed there. The claims 
of the proprietors to jurisdiction, were repudiated by the people; and in 1702, 
they gladly relinquished the government by surrendering it, on the 25th of 

^ These purchasers immediately sold one half of their interest to the Earl of Perth, from whom 
the present town of Perth Amboy derives a part of its name. Amboy, or Amho, is an Indian 
name. 

" A remarkable law was enacted at that session. It provided that in all criminal cases, except 
treason, murder, and theft, the aggrieved party should have power to pardon the ofifender. 

' He was the author of " An Apology for Quakers," a work highly esteemed by his sect. It 
was written in Latin, and translated into several contmental languages. _ Barclay and Penn wero 
intimate personal friends, and travelled much together. He died in Ury, in 1690, aged 42 vears. 

* Page 113, ^ Pages 129, 156, and 158. ° Page'lSO. 



1755.] PENNSYLVANIA. 161 

April, to the crown.' The two provinces were united as a royal domain, and 
placed under the government of Lord Cornburj, the licentious ruler of New 
York,'' in July following. 

The province of New Jersey remained a dependency of New York, with a 
distinct legislative assembly of its own, until 1738, when, through the efforts 
of Lewis Morris,^ the connection was for ever severed. Morris was appointed 
the first royal governor of New Jersey, and managed public affairs with ability 
and general satisfaction. From that period until the independence of the colo- 
nies was declared, in 1776, the history of the colony presents but few events of 
interest to the general reader. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

PENNSYLVANIA. [1682.] 

The colonial career of Pennsylvania began when, in the autumn of 1682, 
William Penn arrived,^ and by a surrender by the agents of the Duke of York, 
and a proclamation in the presence of the popular Assembly, the Territories 
which now constitute the State of Delaware were united with his province.^ 
Already, Penn had proclaimed his intention of being governed by the law of 
kindness in his treatment of the Indians ; and when he came, he proceeded to 
lay the foundation of his new State upon Truth and Justice.^ Where the Ken- 
sington portion of the city of Philadelphia now stands, as we have elsewhere 
mentioned, he met the Delaware chiefs in council, under the leafless branches 
of a wide-spreading elm,^ on the 4th of November, 1682, and there made with 
them a solemn covenant of peace and friendship, and paid them the stipulated 
price for their lands. The Indians were delighted, and their hearts melted with 
good feeling. Such treatment was an anomaly in the history of the intercourse 
of their race with the white people. Even then the fires of a disastrous war 
were smouldering on the New England frontiers. ^ It was wonderful how the 
savage heart, so lately the dwelling of deepest hatred toward the white man, be- 
came the shrine of the holiest attribute of our nature. "We will live in love 



' The proprietors retained their property in the soil, and their claims to quit-rents. Their 
organization has never ceased ; and unsold, barren tracts of land in West Jersey are still held by 
that ancient tenure. ^ Page 149. 

^ Son of an officer in Cromwell's array, who purchased an estate near New York, ivnown as 
Morrisiana He died in 1746. Apart of that estate yet [1883] remauis in possession of the Morris 
famUy. ■• Page 96. ^ Page 96. 

® By his direction, his agent, "William Markham, had opened a friendly correspondence with the 
Indians, and Penn himself had addressed a letter to them, assxiring them of his love and brotherly 
feelings toward them. 

' The Penn Society of Philadelphia erected a monument upon the spot where the venerable elm 
stood, near the intersection of Hanover and Beach-streets, Kensington district. The tree was blown 
down in 1810, and was found to be 283 years old. The monument is upon the site of the tree, and 
bears suitable inscriptions. " King Philip's War, page 92. 




162 THE COLONIES. [1682. 

with William Penn and his children/' they said, "as long as the moon and the 
sun shall endure." Thej were true to their promise — not a drop of Quaker 
blood was ever shed bj an Indian. 

Having secured the lands, Penn's next care was to found a capital city. 
This he proceeded to do, immediately after the treaty with the Indians, upon 
lands purchased from the Swedes, lying between the Delaware and the Schuyl- 
kill Rivers. The boundaries of streets were marked upon the trunks of the 
chestnut, walnut, pine, and othe'r forest trees which covered the land,' and the 
city was named Philadelphia, which signifies brotherly love. Within twelve 
months almost a hundred houses were erected,^ and the Indians came daily 
with wild fowl and venison, as presents for their ' ' good 
Father Penn." Never was a State blessed with a more 
propitious beginning, and internal peace and prosperity 
marked its course while the Quakers controlled its coun- 
cils. 

The proprietor convened a second Assembly at Phil- 
adelphia, in INIarch, 1683, and then gave the people a 
" Charter of Liberties," signed and sealed by his own 
hand. It was so ample and just, that the government 
was really a representative democracy. Free religious toleration was ordained, 
and laws for the promotion of public and private morality were framed.' Un- 
like other proprietors, Penn surrendered to the people his rights in the appoint- 
ment of officers ; and until his death, his honest and highest ambition appeared 
to be to promote the happiness of the colonists. Because of this happy relation 
between the people and the proprietor, and the security against Indian hostili- 
ties, Pennsylvania outstripped all of its sister colonies in rapidity of settlement 
and permanent prosperity. 

In Auo-ust, 1684, Penn returned to England, leaving five members of the 
Council with Thomas Lloyd, as president, to administer the government during 
his absence. Soon afterward, the English Revolution occurred [1688] and 
kino- James was driven into exile.* Penn's personal regard for James contin- 
ued after his fall ; and for that loyalty, which had a deeper spring than mere 
political considerations, he was accused of dissaffection to the new government, 
and suffered imprisonments. In the mean while, discontents had sprung up in 



' This fact was the origin of the names of Chestnut, "Wahmt, Pine, Spruce, and other streets in 
Philadelphia. For many years after the city was laid out, these living street-marks remained, and 
afforded shade to the inhabitants. 

= Markham, Penn's agent, erected a house for the proprietor's use, in 1682. It is yet [1883] 
standing in Letitia court, the entrance to which is from Market-street, between Front and Second- 
streets. Another, and finer house, was occupied by Penu in 1700. It yet remains on the corner 
of Norris's alley and Second-street. It was the residence of General Arnold in 1778. Note 3, 
page 287. 

^ It was ordained " that to prevent lawsuits, three arbitrators, to be called Peace Makers, should 
be appointed by the county courts, to hear and determine small differences between man and man ; 
that children should be taught some useful trade ; that factors wronging their employers should 
make satisfaction, and one third over ; that all causes for irreligion and vulgarity should be repress- 
ed ; and that no man should be molested for his religious opinions. 

* Note 7, page 113. 



1T55.] THE CAROLIKAS. 163 

Pennsylvania, and the ''three lower counties on the Delaware,*' offended at 
rthe action of some of the Council, withdrew from the Union'^ in April, 1691. 
Penn yielded to their washes so far as to appoint a separate deputy governor 
for them. 

An important political change now occurred in the colony. Penn's jjrovin- 
• cial government was taken from him in 1692 [Oct. 31], and Pennsylvania was 
, placed under the authority of Governor Fletcher, of New York, who reunited 
ithe Delaware counties [May, 1693], to the parent province. All suspicions of 
Penn"s disloyalty having been removed in 1694, his chartered rights were 
restored to him [Aug. 30], and he appointed his original agent, William Mark- 
ham, deputy governor. He returned to America in December, 1699, and was 
pained to find his people discontented, and clamorous for greater political priv- 
ileges. Considering their demands reasonable, he gave them a new charter, or 
frame of government [Nov. 6, 1701], more liberal in its concessions than the 
former. It was cheerfully accepted by the Pennsylvania people, but those of 
the Delaware territories, whose delegates had already withdrawn from the 
Assembly [Oct. 20], evidently aiming at independence, declined it. Penn 
acquiesced in their decision, and allowed them a distinct Assembly. This satis- 
:fied them, and their first independent legislature was convened at Newcastle in 
1703. Although Pennsylvania and Delaware ever afterward continued to have 
separate legislatures, they were under the same governor until the Revolution 
in 1776. 

A few weeks after adjusting difficulties, and granting the new charter, Penn 
returned to England [Dec, 1701], and never visited America again. His 
departure was hastened by the ripening of a ministerial project for abolishing 
,^\l the proprietary governments in America. His health soon afterward de- 
<;lined, and at his death he left his American possessions to his three sons 
(Thomas, John, and Richard), then minors, who continued to administer the 
government, chiefly through deputies, until the War for Independence in 1776. 
Then it became a free and independent State, and the commonwealth purchased 
all the claims of Penn's heirs in the province, for about five hundred and eighty 
thousand dollars.' 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE CAROLINAS. [1665 — 1680.] 

Notwithstanding the many failures w^hich had dampened the ardor of 
English speculators, who had engaged in planting settlements in America, hope 
still remained buoyant. Success finally crowned the efforts in New England 



* Page 96. 2 p^g^ 95 

' On account of the expenses incurred in Pennsylvania, Penn was compelled to borrow $30,000, 

and mortgage his province as security. This was the commencement of the State debt of Penuayl- 

vania. 



164 THE COLONIES. 

and further south, and the proprietors of the Carolinas, when settlements- 
within that domain became permanent/ and tides of emigration from various, 
sources flowed thitherward, began to have gorgeous visions of an empire in 
America, that should outshine those of the Old World. It then became their 
first care to frame a constitution of government, with functions adequate to the 
grand design, and to this task, the earl of Shaftesbury, one of the ablest states- 
men of his time, and John Locke, the eminent philosopher, were called. They 
completed their labors in March, 1669, and the instrument was called the 
Fundamental Constitutions?^ It was in the highest degree monarchical in its 
character and tendency, and contemplated the transplantation, in America, of 
all the ranks and aristocratic distinctions of European society.' The spirit of 
the Avhole thing was adverse to the feelings of the people, and its practical 
development was an impossibility ; so, after a contest between proprietors and 
colonists, for twenty years, the magnificent scheme was abandoned, and the 
people were allowed to govern themselves, in their own more simple way." The 
disorders which prevailed when the first attempts Avere made to impose this 
scheme of government upon the people, soon ripened into rebellion, especially in 
the Albemarle^ or northern colony.* Excessive taxation and commercial restric- 
tions bore heavily upon the industry of the people, and engendered wide-spread 
discontent. This was fostered by refugees from Virginia, after Bacon's rebel- 
lion, in 1676,* who sought shelter among the people below the Roanoke. They 
scattered, broad-cast, over a generous soil, vigorous ideas of popular freedom, 
and a year after Bacon's death,'' the people of the Albemarle County Colony'^ 
revolted. The immediate cause of this movement was the attempt of the acting 
governor to enforce the revenue laws against a New England vessel. Led on 
by John Culpepper, a refugee from the Carteret County Colony of South 
Carolina,^ the people seized the chief magistrate [Dec. 10, 1677] and the pub- 
lic funds, imprisoned him and six of his council, called a new Assembly, ap- 
pointed a new magistrate and judges, and for two years conducted the affairs of 
government independent of foreign control. Culpepper went to England to 
plead the cause of the people, and was arrested and tried on a charge of treason. 

' Pages 97 and 98. 

* It consists of one Inindred and twenty articles, and is supposed to have been the production, 
chiefly, of the mind of Shaftesbury. 

^ There were to be two orders of nobility : the higher to consist of landgraves, or earls, the 
lower of caciques, or barons. The territory was to be divided into counties, each containing 480,000 
acres, with one landgrave, and two caciques. There were also to be lords of manors, who, like the 
nobles, might hold courts and exercise judicial functions. Persons holding fifty acres were to be 
freeholders ; the tenants held no pohtical franchise, and coiJd never attain to a higher rank. The 
four estates of proprietors, earls, barons, and commons, were to sit in one legislative chamber. The 
proprietors were always to be eight in number, to possess the whole judicial power, and have the 
' supreme control of all tribunals. The commons were to have four members in the legislature to 
every three of the nobility. Thus an aristocratic majority was always secured, and the real repre- 
sentatives of the people had no power. Every religion was professedly tolerated, but the Church 
of England, only, was declared to bo orthodox. Such is an outline of the absurd scheme proposed 
for governing the free colonies of the Carolinas. 

* A governor, with a council of twelve — six chosen by the proprietors, and six by the Assembly 
^and a House of Delegates chosen by the freeholders. 

» Page 97. « Page 110. ' Page 112. 

* Page 97. * Page 98. 



1680.] THE CAROLINAS. 165 

Shaftesbury procured his acquittal, and he returned to the Carolinas.' Quiet 
was restored to the colony, and until the arrival of the unprincipled Seth 
Sothel (one of the proprietors), as governor, the people enjoyed repose. Thus 
early the inhabitants of that feeble colony practically asserted the grand politi- 
cal maxim, that taxation loithoiit representation is tyranny," for the defense 
of which our Revolutionary fathers fought, a century afterward. 

Governor Sothel arrived in North Carolina in 1683. Martin says that 
*' the dark shades of his character were not relieved by a single ray of virtue ;" 
and Chalmers asserts that " the annals of delegated authority included no name 
so infamous as Sothel." He plundered the people, cheated the proprietors, and 
on all occasions prostituted his office to purposes of private gain. After endur- 
ing his oppression almost six years, the people seized him [1689], and were 
about sending him to England to answer their accusations before the proprietors, 
when he asked to be tried by the colonial Assembly. The favor was granted, 
and he was sentenced to banishment for one year, and a perpetual disquali- 
fication for the office of governor. He withdrew to the southern colony, where 
we shall meet him again.^ His successor, Philip Ludwell, an energetic, incor- 
ruptible man, soon redressed the wrongs of the people, and restored order and 
good feelings. Governors Harvey and Walker also maintained quiet and good 
will among the people. And the good Quaker, John Archdale, Avho came to 
govern both Carolinas in 1695, placed the colony in a position for attaining 
future prosperity, hitherto unknown. 

While these events were transpiring in the northern colony, the people of 
the Carteret^" or southern colony, were steadily advancing in wealth and num- 
bers. Their first popular legislature of which we have records, was convened 
in 1674,5 but it exhibited an unflivorable specimen of republican government. 
Jarring interests and conflicting creeds produced violent debates and irreconcil- 
able discord. For a long time the colony was distracted by quarrels, and 
anarchy prevailed. At length the Stono Indians gathered in bands, and plun- 
dered the plantations of grain and cattle, and even menaced the settlers with 
destruction. The appearance of this common enemy healed their dissensions, 
and the people went out as brothers to chastise the plunderers. They com- 
pletely subdued the Indians, in 1680. Many of them were made prisoners, 
and sold for slaves in the West Indies, and the Stonos never afterward had a 
tribal existence. 

Wearied by the continual annoyance of the Indians, many English fiimilies 



' Culpepper afterward became surveyor-general of the province, and in 1680, he was employed 
in laving out the new city of Charleston." [See next page.] His previous expulsion from the southern 
coloay, was on account of his connection with a rebellious movement in 1672. 

" Page 211. ' Page 167. ■■ Page 98. 

^ The settlers brought with them an unfinished copy of the " Fundamental Constitutions''' but 
they at once perceived the impossibility of conformity to that scheme of government. They held a 
"parliamentary convention" in 1672, and twenty delegates were elected by the people to act with 
the governor and the council, as a legislature. Thus early, representative government was estab- 
lished, but its operations seem not to have been very successful, and a legislature proper, of which 
-we have any record, was not organized until 1674, when an upper and a lower House was estab- 
wiished, and laws for the province were enacted. 



166 



THE COLONIES. 



[166 &.. 



crossed the Ashley, and seated themselves upon the more eligible locality of 
Oyster Point, where they founded the present city of Charleston,' in 1680.. 

There a flourishing village soon appeared ; 
and after the subjugation of the savages,* 
the old settlement Avas abandoned, and now 
not a vestige of it remains upon the culti- 
vated plantation at Old Town, where it. 
stood. The Dutch settlers'* spread over- 
the country along the Edisto and San- 
tee, and planted the seeds of future flour- 




CHARLESTON IN IGSO. 



ton and vicinity. Nor did they 



different parts of Europe and from New 
England swelled the population of Charles- 
neglect political affairs. While they were- 
vigilant in all that pertained to their material interests, they were also aspir- 
ants, even at that early day, for political independence. 

Another popular legislature was convened at Charleston in 1682. It ex- 
hibited more harmony than the first, ^ and several useful laws were framed. 
Emigration Avas now pouring in a tide of population more rapid than any of the 
colonies below New England had yet experienced. Ireland, Scotland,^ Holland, 
and France, contributed largely to the flowing stream. In 1686-7, quite a, 
large number of Huguenots, who had escaped from the fiery persecutions which 
were revived in France by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes,^ landed at 
Charleston. English hatred of the French' caused the settlers to look Avith 
jealousy upon these refugees, and for more than ten years [1686 to 1697] the 
latter Avere denied the rights of citizenship. 

Shaftesbury's scheme of government AA'as as distasteful to the people of 
South Carolina, as to those of the northern colony,^ and they refused to accept 
it. They became very restive, and seemed disposed to cast off all allegiance tO' 
the proprietors and the mother country. At this crisis, James Colleton, a 
brother of one of the proprietors, was appointed governor [1686]. and was 
vested Avith full powers to bring the colonists into submission. His administra- 
tion of about four years was a very turbulent one. He was in continual colli- 

* Note 1, page 165, The above engraving illustrates the manner of fortifying towns, as a de- 
fense against foes. It exhibits the walls of Charleston in 1680, and the location of churches in 
1704. The points marked a a a, etc., are bastions for cannons. P, English church; Q, French^ 
church ; R, Independent church ; S, Anabaptist church ; and T, Quaker meeting-house. 

^ Page 165. 

^ They had founded the village of Jamestown several miles up the Ashley River. 

* Page 164. 

* In 1684, Lord Cardrosa, and ten Scotch families, who had suffered persecution, came to South 
Carolina, and settled at Port Royal. The Spaniards at St. Augustine claimed jurisdiction over Port 
Royal ; and during the absence of Cardon [1686], they attacked and dispersed the settlers, and des- 
olated their plantations. 

" In the city of Nantes, Henry the Fourth of Prance issued an edict, in 1598, in favor of the 
Huguenots, or Protestants, allowing them free toleration. The profligate Louis the Fourteenth, 
stung with remorse in his old age, sought to gain the favor of Heaven by bringing his whole people 
into the bosom of the Roman Gatliolic Church. He revoked the famous edict in 1686, and instantly 
the fires of persecution were kindled throughout the empire. Many thousands of the Protestants- 
left France, and Ibund refuge in other countries. ' Page 180. * Page 97- 



1755.] THE CAROL IN AS. 167 

sion with the people, and at length drove them to open rebellion. They seized 
the public records, imprisoned the secretary of the province, and called a new 
Assembly. Pleading the danger of an Indian or Spanish invasion,' the gov- 
ernor called out the militia, and proclaimed the province to be under martial 
law.' This measure only increased the exasperation of the people, and he waa 
impeached, and banished from the province by the Assembly, in 1690. 

While this turbulence and misrule was at its height, Sothel arrived from 
North Carolina, pursuant to his sentence of banishment, ^ and the people un- 
wisely consented to his assumption of the office of governor.* They soon 
repented their want of judgment. For two years he plundered and oppressed 
them, and tj^en [1692] the Assembly impeached and banished him also. Then 
came Philip Ludwell to re-establish the authority of the proprietors, but the 
people, thoroughly aroused, resolved not to tolerate even so good a man as he, 
if his mission was to enforce obedience to the absurd Fundamental Constitu- 
tions.^ After a brief and turbulent administration, he gladly withdrew to Vir- 
ginia, and soon afterward [1693], the proprietors abandoned Shaftesbury's 
scheme, and the good Quaker, John Archdale, was sent, in 1695, to administer 
a more simple and republican form of government, for both the Carolinas. His 
administration was short, but highly beneficial ;^ and the people of South Car- 
olina always looked back to the eiforts of that good man, with gratitude. He 
healed dissensions, established equitable laws, and so nearly effected an entire 
reconciliation of the English to the French settlers, that in the year succeeding 
his departure from the province, the Assembly admitted the latter [1697] to all 
the privileges of citizens and freemen. From the close of Archdale's adminis- 
tration, the progress of the two Carolina colonies should be considered as separ- 
ate and distinct, although they were not politically separated until 1729.'^ 

NORTH CAROLINA. 

We may properly date the permanent prosperity of North Carolina from the 
adminstration of Archdale," when the colonists began to turn their attention to 
the interior of the country, where richer soil invited the agriculturist, and the 
fur of the beaver and otter allured the adventurous hunter. The Indians along 
the sea-coast were melting away like frost in the sunbeams. The powerful 
Hatteras tribe," which numbered three thousand in Raleigh's time, were reduced 
to fifteen bowmen ; another tribe had entirely disappeared ; and the remnants 
of some others had sold their lands or lost them by fraud, and were driven back 
to the deep wilderness. Indulgence in strong drinks, and other vices of civiliz- 

' The Spaniards at St. Augustine had menaced the English settlements in South Carolina, and, 
as we have seen [note 5, page 1 6G], had actually broken up a little Scotch colony at Port Royal. 
' Note 8, page 170. ' Page 165. 

* On his arrival, Sothel took sides with the people against Colleton, and thus, in the moment of 
their anger, he unfortunately gained their good will and confidence. ' Page 1 64. 

* The culture of rice was introduced into South Carolina during Archdale's administration. 
Some seed was given to the governor by the captain of a vessel from Madagascar. It was distrib 
uted among several planters, and thus its cultivation began. 

' Page 171. 8 p.,gg igg_ 9 jq-Qte 5, page 20. 



168 THE COLONIES. [1665. 

ation, had decimated them, and their beautiful land, all the way to the Yadkin 
and Catawba, Avas speedily opened to the sway of the white man. 

At the commencement of the eighteenth century, religion began to exert an 
influence in North Carolina. The first Anglican' church edifice was then built 
in Chowan county, in 1705. The Quakers' multiplied; and in 1707, a com- 
pany of Huguenots,^ who had settled in Virginia, came and sat down upon the 
beautiful banks of the Trent, a tributary of the Neuse River. Two years later 
[1709 j, a hundred German families, driven from their homes on the Rhine, by 
persecution, penetrated the interior of North Carolina, and under Count Graf- 
fenried, founded settlements along the head waters of the Neuse, and upon the 
Roanoke. While settlements Avere thus spreading and strengthening, and gen- 
eral prosperity blessed the province, a fearful calamity fell upon the inhabitants 
of the interior. The broken Indian tribes made a last effort, in 1711, to regain 
the beautiful country they had lost. The leaders in the conspiracy to crush 
the "vshite people, were the Tuscaroras^ of the inland region, and the Corees' 
further south and near the sea-board. They fell like lightning from the clouds 
upon the scattered German settlements along the Roanoke and Pamlico Sound. 
In one night [Oct. 2, 1711], one hundred and thirty persons perished by the 
hatchet. Along Albemarle Sound, the savages swept with the knife of mur- 
der in one hand, and the torch of desolation in the other, and for three days 
they scourged the white people, until disabled by fatigue and drunkenness. 
Those who escaped the massacre called upon their brethren of the southern 
colony for aid, and Colonel Barnwell, with a party of Carolinians and friendly 
Indians of the southern nations,*' marched to their relief. He drove the Tus- 
caroras to their fortified town in the present Craven county, and there made a 
treaty of peace with them. His troops violated the treaty on their way back, 
by outrages upon the Indians, and soon hostilities were renewed. Late in the 
year [Dec, 1712], Colonel Moore'' arrived from South Carolina with a few white 
men and a large body of Indians, and drove the Tuscaroras to their fort in the 
present Greene county, wherein [March, 1713] he made eight hundred of them 
prisoners. The remainder of the Tuscaroras fled northward in June, and join- 
ing their kindred on the southern borders of Lake Ontario, they formed the 
sixth nation of the celebrated Iroquois confederacy in the province of New 
York.8 A treaty of peace was made with the Corees in 1715, and North Car- 
olina never afterward suffered from Indian hostilities.^ 

SOUTH CAROLINA. 

Although really united, the two colonies acted independently of each other 
from the close of the seventeenth century. Soon after the commencement of 

' The established Church of England was so called, to distinguish it from the Romish Church. 
' Page 122. ^ Page 49. ^ Page 25. ' Page 20. 

* Tliey consisted of Creeks, Catawbas, Cherokees, and Tamassees. See pages 26 to 30, inclusive. 
■" A son of James Moore, who was governor of South Carolina in 1700. * Page 23. 

^ The province issued bills of credit (for the first time) to the amount of about forty thousand 
doUars, to defray the expenses of the war. 



1755.] THE CAROLINAS. 169 

Queen Anne's War' [May, 1702], Governor Moore of South Carolina, proposed 
an expedition against the Spaniards at St. Augustine.^ The Assembly assented, 
and appropriated almost ten thousand dollars for the service. Twelve hundred 
men (one half Indians) were raised, and proceeded, in two divisions, to the 
attack. The main division, under the governor, went by sea, to blockade the 
harbor, and the remainder proceeded along the coast, under the command of 
Colonel Daniels. The latter arrived first, and attacked and plundered the 
town. The Spaniards retired within their fortress with provisions for four 
months ; and as the Carolinians had no artillery, their position Avas impreg- 
nable. Daniels was then sent to Jamaica, in the West Indies, to procure bat- 
tery cannon, but before his return, two Spanish vessels had appeared, and so 
frightened Governor Moore that he raised the blockade, and fled. Daniels 
barely escaped capture, on his return, but he reached Charleston in safety. 
This ill-advised expedition burdened the colony with a debt of more than 
twenty-six thousand dollars, for the payment of which, bills of credit were 
issued. This was the first emission of paper money in the Carolinas. 

A more successful expedition was undertaken by Governor Moore, in De- 
cember, 1703, against the Apalachian^ Indians, who Avere in league with the 
Spaniards. Their chief villages were betAveen the Alatamaha and SaA^annah 
Rivers. These were desolated. Almost eight hundred Indians were taken 
prisoners, and the Avhole territory of the Apalachians Avas made tributary to the 
English. The province had scarcely become tranquil after this chastisement of 
the Indians, Avhen a new cause for disquietude appeared. Some of the proprie- 
tors had long cherished a scheme for establishing the Anglican Church,^ as the 
State religion, in the Carolinas. When Nathaniel Johnson succeeded Governor 
Moore, he found a majority of churchmen in the Assembly, and by their aid, 
the Avishes of the proprietors A\-ere gratified. The Anglican Church was made 
the established religion, and Dissenters^ were excluded from all public ofiices. 
This Avas an usurpation of chartered rights ; and the aggrieved party laid the 
matter before the imperial ministry. Their cause was sustained ; and by order 
of Parliament, the colonial Assembly, in November, 1706, repealed the law of 
disfranchisement, but the Church maintained its dominant position until the 
Revolution. 

The ire of the Spaniards was greatly excited by the attack upon St. Augus- 
tine,"^ and an expedition, composed of five French and Spanish vessels,'' with a 
large body of troops, Avas sent from Havana to assail Charleston, take posses- 
sion of the proAdnce, and annex it to the Spanish domain of Florida. ^ The 
squadron crossed Charleston bar in May, 1706, and about eight hundred troops 
were landed at different points. The people seized their arms, and, led by the 
governor and Colonel Rhett, they drove the invaders back to their vessels, after 

' Page 135. ^ Page 51. 

° A tribe of the Mobilian family [page 29] situated south of the Savannah Piiver. 
* Note 1, page 168. ^ Note 2, page 76. ^ Page 51. 

' It will be remembered [see page 135] that in 1702, England declared war against France, and 
*hat Spain was a party to the quarrel. * Page 42. 



170 THE COLONIES. [1665. 

killing or capturing almost three Inindred men. They also captured a French, 
vessel, with its crew. It was a complete victory. So the storm which appeared 
so suddenly and threatening, was dissipated in a day, and the sunshine of peace 
and i^rosperity again gladdened the colony. 

A few years later, a more formidable tempest brooded over the colony,, 
when a general Indian confedei-acy was secretly formed, to exterminate the 
white people by a single blow. AVithin forty days, in the spring of 1715, the 
^ndian tribes from the Cape Fear to the St. Mary's, and back to the moun- 
tains, had coalesced in the conspiracy ; and before the people of Charleston had 
any intimation of danger, one hundred white victims had been sacrified in the 
remote settlements. The Creeks,^ Yamassees,- and Apalachians'^ on the south, 
confederated with the Cherokees,'* Catawbas", and Congarees'' on the west, in all. 
six thousand strong ; while more than a thousand warriors issued from the 
Neuse region, to avenge their misfortunes in the wars of 1712-13,' It was a 
cloud of fearful portent that hung in the sky; and the people Avere filled with 
terror, for they knew not it what moment the consuming lightning might leap- 
forth. At this fearful o-isis, Governor Craven acted with the utmost wisdom 
and energy. He took measures to prevent men from leaving the colony ; to 
secure all the arms and ammunition that could be found, and to arm faithful 
negroes to assist the white people. He declared the province to be under martial 
law,* and then, at ths head of twelve hundred men, black and white, he marched 
to meet the foe, who w^ere advancing with the knife, hatchet, and torch, in 
fearful activity. The Indians were at first victorious, but after several bloody 
encounters, ^,he Yamassees and their southern neighbors were driven across the- 
S&vannah [May, 1715], and halted not until they found refuge under Spanish 
guns at St. Augustine. The Cherokees and their northern neighbors had not 
yet engaged in the war, and they returned to their hunting grounds, deeply 
impressed with the strength and greatness of the white people. 

And now the proprietary government of South Carolina was drawing to Ov 
close. The governors being independent of the people, were often haughty and 
exacting, and the inhabitants had borne the yoke of their rule for many years,, 
with great impatie->ce. While their labor was building u]) a jDrosperous State,, 
the proprietors re^'ased to assist them in times of danger, or to reimburse 
their expenses irv '.he protection of the province from invasion. The whole 
burden of debt ncurred in the war w^ith the Yamassees was left iipon the 
shoulders of thf people. The proprietors not only refused to pay any portion^ 
of it, but enftvri'ed their claims for quit-rents with great severity. The people 
saw no hope hi the future, but in royal rule and protection. So they met 
in convention; resolved to forswear all allegiance to the proprietors; and on 
Governov Johnson's refusal to act as chief magistrate, under the king, they 



1 Pase 30. - Piio-e 30. s Note 3, page 168. * Page 27. ^ pagc 26. 

6 This was a small tribe that inhabited the country in the vicinity of the present city of Colum- 
bia, in South Carolina. 

' Page 168. 

8 Martial law may be proclaimed by rulers, in an emergency, and the civil law, for the time 
being, is made subservient to the military. Tlie object is to allow immediate and energetic action 
for repelling invasions, or for other purposes. 



l"755.] GEORGIA. 171 

appointed [December 21, 1719] Colonel Moore' governor of the colony. The 
matter was laid before the imperial government, when the colonists were sus- 
tained, and South Carolina became a rojal province." 

The people of North Carolina' also resolved on a change of government; 
anJ after a continued controversy for ten years, the proprietors, in 1729, sold 
to the king, for about eighty thousand dollars, all their claims to the soil and 
incomes in both provinces. North and South Carolina Avere then separated. 
George Burrington Avas appointed the first royal governor over the former, and 
Robert Johnson over the latter. From that period until the commencement of 
the French and Indian war," the general history of the Carolinas presents but 
few features of interest, except the efforts made for defending the colony against 
the Spaniards and the Indians. The peoiole gained very little by a change of 
owners ; and during forty-five years, until the revolution made the people 
independent, there was a succession of disputes with the royal governors. 



C II A P T E R X . 

GEORGIA. [1732.] 

The colony founded by Oglethorpe on the Savannah River rapidly 
increased in numbers, and within eight years, twenty-five hundred immigrants 
were sent over, at an expense to the trustees' of four hundred thousand dollars. 
Yet prosperity did not bless the enterprise. Many of the settlers were unac- 
customed to habits of industry, and were mere drones ; and as the use of slave 
labor was prohibited, tillage was neglected. Even the industrious Scotch, Ger- 
man, and Swiss families who came over previous to 1740, could not give that 
vitality to industrial pursuits, which was necessary to a development of the 
resources of the country. Anxious for the permanent growth of the colony, 
Oglethorpe went to England in 1734, and returned in 1736, with about three 
hundred immigrants. Among them were one lAndred and fifty Highlanders, 
well skilled in military affairs. These constituted the first army of the colony 
during its early struggles. John Wesley, founder of the Methodist denom- 
ination, also came with Oglethorpe, to make Georgia a religious colony, and to 
spread the gospel among the Indians. He was unsuccessful ; for his strict 
moral doctrines, his fearless denunciations of vice, and his rigid exercise of 
ecclesiastical authority made him quite unpopular among the great mass of the 
colonists, Avho winced at restraint. The eminent George Whitefield also visited 
Georgia in 1738, when only twenty-three years of age, and succeeded in estab- 
lishing an orphan asylum near Savannah, which flourished many years, and 

' Note 7, page 168. 

" The first governor, by royal appointment, was Francis Nicholson, who had been 
governor of New York [page 144], Maryland, Virginia, and Nova Scotia. 

^ Page 167. . * Page 179. ' Page 100, 



j^Y'2 THE COLONIES. [1132. 

■was a real blessing. ' The Christian efforts of those men, prosecuted with the 
most sincere desire for the good of their fellow-mortals, were not appreciated. 
Their seed fell upon stonj ground, and after the death of Whitefield, in 1770, 
his " House of Mercy" in Georgia, deprived of his sustaining influence, became 
a desolation. 

A cloud of trouble appeared in the Southern horizon. The rapid increase 
of the new colony excited the jealousy of the Spaniards at St. Augustine, and 
the vigilant Oglethorpe, expecting such a result, prepared to oppose any hos- 
tile movements against his settlement. He established a fort on the site of 
Augusta, as a defence against the Indians, and he erected fortifications at 
Darien, on Cumberland Island, at Frederica (St. Simon's Island), and on the 
north bank of the St. John, the southern boundary of the English claims. 
Spanish commissioners came from St. Augustine to protest against these prepar- 
ations, and to demand the immediate evacuation of the whole of Georgia, and 
of all South Carolina below Port Royal.' Oglethorpe, of course, refused com- 
pliance, and the Spaniards threatened him with war. In the winter of 1736-7, 
Oglethorpe went to England to make preparations to meet the exigency. He 
returned in October following, bearing the commission of a brigadier, and lead- 
ing a regiment of six hundred well-disciplined troops, for the defense of the 
•whole southern frontier of the English possessions." But for two years their 
services were not much needed ; then war broke out between England and 
Spain [November, 1739], and Oglethorpe prepared an expedition against St. 
Augustine. In May, 1740, he entered Florida with four hundred of his best 
troopa, some volunteers from South Carolina, and a large body of friendly 
Creek Indians f in all more than two thousand men. His first conquest was 
Fort Diego, tAventy miles from St. Augustine. Then Fort Moosa, within two 
miles of the city, surrendered ; but when he appeared before the town and for- 
tress, and demanded instant submission, he was answered by a defiant refusal. 
A small fleet under Captain Price blockaded the harbor, and for a time cut off 
supphes from the Spaniards, but swift- winged galleys^' passed through the block- 
ading fleet, and supplied the garrison with several weeks' provisions. Ogle- 
thorpe had no artillery with which to attack the fortress, and being warned by 
the increasing heats of summCT, and sickness in his camp, not to wait for their 
supplies to become exhausted, he raised the siege and returned to Savannah. 

The ire of the Spaniards was aroused, and they, in turn, prepared to invade 
Georgia in the summer of 1742. An armament, fitted out at Havana and St. 
Augustine, and consisting of thirty-six vessels, with more than three thousand 
troops, entered the harbor of St. Simon's, and landed a little above the town 
of the same name, on the 16th of July, 1742, and erected a battery of twenty 
guns. Oglethorpe had been apprised of the intentions of the Spaniards, and 



' Note 5, page 166. 

^ His commission gave him the command of the militia of South CaroUna also, and he stood as 
a guard between the English and Spanish possessions of the southern country. ' Page 30. 

^ A low built vessel propelled by both sails and oars. The war vessels of the ancients were all 
galleys. See Norman vessel, page 35. 



1732.] GEORGIA. 17^5 

after unsuccessfully applying to the governor of South Carolina for troops and 
supplies, he marched to St. Simon's, and made his head- quarters at his princi- 
fortress at Frederica." He was at Fort Simon, near the landing place of the 
invaders, with less than eight hundred men, exclusive of Indians, when the 
enemy appeared. He immediately spiked the guns of the fort, destroyed his 
stores, and retreated to Frederica. There he anxiously awaited hoped-for rein- 
forcements and supplies from Carolina, and then he successfully repulsed several 
detachments of the Spaniards, who attacked him. He finally resolved to make 
a night assault upon the enemy's battery, at St. Simon's. A deserter (a 
French soldier) defeated his plan ; but the sagacity of Oglethorpe caused the 
miscreant to be instrumental in driving the invaders from the coast. He bribed 
a Spanish prisoner to carry a letter to the deserter, which contained information 
respecting a British fleet that was about to attack St. Augustine." Of course 
the letter was handed to the Spanish commander, and the Frenchman was 
arrested as a spy. The intelligence in Oglethorpe's letter alarmed the enemy, 
and while the oflBcers were holding a council, some Carolina vessels, with sup- 
plies for the garrison at Frederica, appeared in the distance. Believing them 
to be part of the British fleet alluded to, the Spaniards determined to attack 
the Georgians immediately, and then hasten to St. Augustine. On their march 
to assail Frederica, they were ambuscaded in a swamp. Great slaughter of the 
invaders ensued, and the place is still called Bloody Marsh. The survivors 
retreated in confusion to their vessels, and sailed immediately to St. Augustine.' 
On their way, they attacked the English fort at the southern extremity of Cum- 
berland Island,* on the 19th of July, but were repulsed with the loss of two 
galleys. The whole expedition was so disastrous to the Spaniards, that the 
commander (Don Manuel de Monteano) was dismissed from the service. Ogle- 
thorpe's stratagem saved Georgia, and, perhaps, South Carolina, from utter 
ruin. 

Having fairly established his colony, Oglethorpe went to England in 1743, 
and never returned to Georgia, where, for ten years, he had nobly labored to 
secure an attractive asylum for the oppressed.* He left the province in a tran- 
quil state. The mild military rule under which the people had lived, was 
changed to civil government in 1743, administered by a president and council, 
under the direction of the trustees," yet the colony continued to languish. 
Several causes combined to produce this condition. We have already alluded 
to the inefficiency of most of the earlier settlers, and the prohibition of slave 
labor.' They were also deprived of the privileges of commerce and of traffic 

' The remains of Fort Frederica yet formed a very picturesque ruin on the plantation of 
W. W. Hazzard, Esq., of St. Simon's Island, in 1856. 

"^ Oglethorpe addressed the Frenchman as if he was a spy of the English. He directed the 
deserter to represent the Georgians as in a weak condition, to advise the Spaniards to attack them 
immediately, and to persuade the Spaniards to remain three days longer, within which time six 
British men-of-war, and two thousand men, from Carolina, would probably enter the harbor of St. 
Augustine. 

' They first burned Fort Simon, but in their haste they left several of their cannons and a 
quantity of provisions behind them. 

* Fort William. There was another small fort on the northern end of the island, called Fort 
Andrew. * Page 100. ^ Page 100. ' Page 171. 



174 THE COLONIES. [1492. 

With the Indians ; and were not allowed the ownership, in fee, of the lands 
which thej cultivated/ In consequence of these restrictions, there were no 
incentives to labor, except to supply daily wants. General discontent pre- 
vailed. They saw the Carolinians growing rich by the use of slaves, and by 
commerce with the West Indies. Gradually the restrictive laws were evaded. 
Slaves Avere brought from Carolina, and hired, first for a short period, and then 
for a hundred years, or for life. The price paid for life-service was the money 
value of the slave, and the transaction was, practically, a sale and purchase. 
Then slave-ships came to Savannah directly from Africa ; slave labor was gen- 
erally used in 1750, and Georgia became a planting State. In 1752, at the 
expiration of the twenty-one years named in the patent,'^ the trustees gladly 
resigned the charter into the hands of the king, and from that time until the 
Hevolution, Georgia remained a royal province. 



CHAPTER XI. 

A RETROSPECT. [1492—1756.] 

In the preceding pages we have considered the principal events which 
occurred within the domain of our Republic from the time of first discoveries, 
in 1492, to the commencement of the last inter-colonial war between the En- 
glish and French settlers, a period of about two hundred and sixty years. 
During that time, fifteen colonies were planted,^ thirteen of which were com- 
menced within the space of about fifty-six years — from 1607 to 1673. By the 
union of Plymouth and Massachusetts,* and Connecticut and New Haven,^ the 
number of colonies was reduced to thirteen, and these were they which went 
into the revolutionary contest in 1775. The provinces of Canada and Nova 
Scotia, conquered by the English, remained loyal, and to this day they continue 
to be portions of the British empire. 

In the establishment of the several colonies, which eventually formed the 
thirteen United States of America, several European nations contributed vig- 
orous materials ; and people of opposite habits, tastes, and religious faith, became 
commingled, after making impressions of their distinctive characters where their 
influence was first felt. England furnished the largest proportion of colonists, 
and her children always maintained sway in the government and industry of the 
whole country ; while Scotland, Ireland, Germany, Holland, France, Sweden, 
Denmark, and the Baltic region, contributed large quotas of people and other 
colonial instrumentalities. Churchmen and Dissenters,^ Roman Catholics and 



» Page 116. » Page 100. 

' Virginia, Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay, New Hampshire, Connecticut, New Haven, Rhods 
Island, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, North and South Carolina, and 
Georgia. * Page 132. * Page 89. * Note 2, page 76. 



1756.] A RETROSPECT. 175 

■Quakers,' came and sat down by the side of each other. For a while, the dis- 
sonance of nations and creeds prevented entire harmony ; but the freedom en- 
joyed, the perils and hardships encountered and endured, the conflicts with 
pagan savages on one hand, and of hierarchica? and governmental oppression 
on the other, Avhich they maintained for generations, shoulder to shoulder, dif- 
fused a brotherhood of feeling throughout the Avhole social body of the colonists, 
and resulted in harmony, sympathy, and love. And when, as children of one 
iamily, they loyally defended the integrity of Great Britain (then become the 
'•mother country" of nearly all) against the aggressions of the French and In- 
dians" [1756 to 1763], and yet were compelled, by the unkindness of that 
mother, to sever the filial bond^ [1776], their hearts beat as with one pulsation, 
and they struck the dismembering blow as with one hand. 

There was a great diversity of character exhibited by the people of the sev- 
eral colonies, differing according to their origin and the influence of climate and 
pursuits. The Virginians and their southern neighbors, enjoying a mild cli- 
mate, productive of tendencies to voluptuousness and ease, were from those 
-classes of English society where a lack of rigid moral discipline allowed free 
living and its attendant vices. They generally exhibited less moral restraint, 
more hospitality, and greater frankness, and social refinement, than the people 
of New England. The latter were from among the middle classes, and in- 
cluded a great many religious enthusiasts, possessing more zeal than knowl- 
edge. They were extremely strict in their notions ; very rigid in manners, 
and jealous of strangers. Their early legislation, recognizing, as it did, the 
most minute regulations of social life, often presented food for merriment.^ 
Yet their intentions were pure ; their designs were noble ; and, in a great de- 
gree, their virtuous purposes were accomplished. They aimed to make every 
member of society a Christian, according to their own pattern ; and if they 
did not fully accomplish their object, they erected strong bulwarks against those 



' Note 6, page 122, and note 3, page 123. 

" Hierarchy is, in a general sense, a priestly or ecclesiastical government. Such was the original 
form of government of the ancient Jews, when the priesthood held absolute rule. 

' Period IV., chapter xii., page 179. ■* Page 251. 

* They assumed the right to regulate the expenditures of the people, even for wearing-apparel, 
according to their several incomes. The general court of Massachusetts, on one occasion, required 
the proper officers to notice tlie " apparel" of the people, especially their " ribands and great boots." 
Drinking of healths, wearing funeral badges, and many other things that seemed improper, were 
forbidden. At Hartford, the general court kept a constant eye upon the morals of the people. Free- 
men were compelled to vote under penalty of a fine of sixpence ; the use of tobacco was prohibited 
to persons under twenty years of age, without the certificate of a physician ; and no others were 
allowed to use it more than once a day, and then they must be ten miles from any house. The 
people of Hartford were all obliged to rise in the morning when the watchman rang his bell. These 
are but a few of the hundreds of similar enactments found on the records of the New England 
courts. In 1646, the Legislature of Massachusetts passed a law, which imposed the penalty of a 
flogging upon any one who should kiss a woman in the streets. More than a hundred years after- 
ward, this law was enforced in Boston. The captain of a British man-of-war happened to return 
from a cruise, on Sunday. His oveijoyed wife met him on the wharf, and he kissed her several 
times. The magistrates ordered him to be flogged. The punishment incurred no ignominy, and he 
associated freely with the best citizens. When about to depart, tlie captain invited the magistrates 
and others on board his vessel to dine. When dinner was over, he caused all the magistrates to 
be flogged, on deck, in sight of the town. Then assuring them that he considered accounts settled 
between him and them, he dismissed them, and set sail. 



176 



THE COLOXIES. 



[1492. 











little vices which compose great private and public 
evils. Dwelling upon a parsimonious soil, and pos- 
sessing neither the means nor the inclination for 
sumptuous living, indulged in by their southern breth- 
ren, their dwellings were simple, and their habits 
frugal. 

In New York, and portions of Pennsylvania and 
New Jersey, the manners, customs, and pursuits ot 

the Dutch prevailed even a century after the English 
conquest of New Netherland' [1664], and society had become 
permeated by English ideas and customs. They were plodding 
money-getters ; abhorred change and innovation, and loved ease. 
They possessed few of the elements of progress, but many of th& 
substantial social virtues necessary to the stability of a State, and 
the health of society. From these the Swedes and Finns upon the 
Delaware' did not differ much ; but the habits of the Quakers, 
who finally predominated in West Jersey^ and Pennsylvania,* 
were quite different. They always exhibited a refined simplicity 
and equanimity, without ostentatious displays of piety, that won 
esteem ; and they were governed by a religious sentiment without 
fanaticism, which formed a powerful safeguard against vice and 
immorality. 

In Maryland,^ the earlier settlers were also less rigid moralists than the 
New Englanders, and greater formalists in religion. They were more refined, 
equally industrious, but lacked the stability of character and perseverance 
in pursuits, of the people of the East. But at the close of the period we have 
been considering [1756], the peculiarities of the inhabitants of each section 
were greatly modified by inter-migration, and a general conformity to the ne- 
cessities of their several conditions, as founders of new States in a wilderness. 
The tooth of religious bigotry and intolerance had lost its keenness and its 
poison, and when the representatives of the several colonies met in a general 
Congress' [Sept., 1774], for the public good, they stood as brethren before one 
altar, while the eloquent Duche laid the fervent petitions of their hearts before 
the throne of Omnipotence.^ 

The chief pursuit of the colonists was, necessarily, agriculture ; yet, during 
the time we have considered, manufactures and commerce were not wholly neg- 
lected. Necessity compelled the people to make many things which their 
poverty would not allow them to buy ; and manual labor, especially in the New 
England provinces, was dignified from the beginning. The settlers came where 
a throne and its corrupting influences were unknown, and where the idleness 
and privileges of aristocracy had no abiding-place. In the magnificent forests 



' This is a picture of one of the oldest houses in New Ene:land, and is a favorable specimen of 
the best class of frame dweUings at that time. It is yet [1883] standing, we beUeve, near Medfield, 
iu Massachusetts. ' Page 144. = Page 93. " Page 160. 

" Page 161. ' Page 81. ' Page 228. * Page 228. 



1156.] A RETROSPECT, 177 

of the New World, where a feudal lord' had never stood, they began a life full 
of youth, vigor, and labor, such as the atmosphere of the elder governments of 
the earth could not then sustain. They were compelled to be self-reliant, and 
what they could not buy from the workshops of England for their simple ap- 
parel and furniture, and implements of culture, they rudely manufactured," and 
were content. 

The commerce of the colonies had but a feeble infancy ; and never, until 
they were politically separated from Great Britain [1776 J, could their inter- 
change of commodities be properly dignified with the name of Commerce. En- 
gland early became jealous of the independent career of the colonists in respect 
to manufactured articles, and navigation acts,^ and other unwise and unjust 
restraints upon the expanding industry of the Americans, were brought to bear 
upon them. As early as 1636, a Massachusetts vessel of thirty tons made a 
trading voyage to the West Indies; and two years later [1638], another vessel 
went from Salem to New Providence, and returned with a cargo of salt, cotton, 
tobacco, and negroes.* This was the dawning of commerce in America. The 
eastern people also engaged quite extensively in fishing ; and all were looking 
forward to wealth from ocean traffic, as well as that of the land, when the pass- 
age of the second Navigation Act,^ in 1660, evinced the strange jealousy of 
Great Britain. From that period, the attention of Parliament was often 
directed to the trade and commerce of the colonies, and in 1719, the House of 
Commons declared "that erecting any manufactories in the colonies, tended to 
lessen their dependence upon Great Britain." Woolen goods, paper, hemp, 
and iron were manufactured in Massachusetts and other parts of New England, 
as early as 1732 ; and almost every family made coarse cloth for domestic use. 
Heavy duties had been imposed upon colonial iron sent to England ; and the 
colonists, thus deprived of their market for pig iron, were induced to attempt 
the manufacture of steel and bar iron for their own use. It was not until 
almost a century [1750] afterward that the mother country perceived the folly 
of her policy in this respect, and admitted colonial pig iron, duty free, first into 
London, and soon afterward into the rest of the kingdom. Hats were manufac- 



' Note 15, page 62. 

' From the beginning of colonization there were shoemakers, tailors, and blacksmiths in the sev- 
eral colonies. Chalmers says of New England in 1673: "There be fine iron works which cast no 
guns ; no house in New England has above twenty rooms ; not twenty in Boston have ten rooms 
each ; a dancing-school was set up here, but put down ; a fencing-school is allowed. There be no 
musicians by trade. All cordage, sail-cloth, and mats, come from England ; no cloth made there 
worth four shillings per yard ; no alum, no copperas, no salt, made by their sun." 

' The first Navigation Act [1651] forbade all importations into England, except in English 
Bhips, or those belonging to English colonies. In 1660, this act was confirmed, and unjust additions 
were made to it. The colonies were forbidden to export their chief productions to any country ex- 
cept to England or its dependencies. Similar acts, aU bearing heavily upon colonial commerce, 
were made law, from time to time. See note 4, page 109. 

* This was the first introduction of slaves into New England. The first slaves introduced into 
the English colonies, were those landed and sold in Virginia in 1620. [See note 6, page 105.] They 
were first recognized as such, by law, in Massachusetts, in 1641 ; in Connecticut and Rhode Island, 
about 1650; in New York, in 1656; in Maryland, in 1663 ; and in New Jersey, in 1665. There 
were but few slaves in Pennsylvania, and those were chiefly in Philadelphia. There were some 
there as early as 1690. The people of Delaware held some at about the same time. The introduc- 
tion of slaves into the Carolinas was coeval with their settlement, and into Georgia about the year 
1750, when the people generally evaded the prohibitory law. Page 174. * Note 4, page 109. 

12 



l^g THE COLO X IE S. [1492. 

tured and carried from one colony to the other in exchange ; and at about the 
same time, brigantines and small sloops were built in Massachusetts and Penn- 
sylvania, and exchanged with West India merchants for rum, sugar, wines, and 
silks. These movements Avere regarded with disfavor by the British Govern- 
•ment, and unwisely considering the increase of manufactures in the colonies to 
be detrimental to English interests, greater restrictions were ordained. It was 
enacted that all manufactories of iron and steel in the colonies, should be con- 
sidered a "common nuisance," to be abated within thirty days after notice 
being given, or the owner should suffer a fine of a thousand dollars.' The ex- 
portation of hats even from one colony to another was prohibited, and no hatter 
was allowed to have more than two apprentices at one time. The importation 
of sugar, rum, and molasses was burdened wdtli exorbitant duties ; and the Caro- 
linians were forbidden to cut down the pine-trees of their vast forests, and con- 
vert their wood into staves, and their juice into turpentine and tar, for commer- 
cial purposes.'' These unjust and oppressive enactments formed a part of that 
" bill of particulars" which the American colonies presented in their account 
with Great Britain, when they gave to the world their reasons for declaring 
themselves " free and independent States." 

From the beginning, education received special attention in the colonies, 
particularly in New England. Schools for the education of both white and 
Indian children were formed in Virginia as early as 1621 ; and in 1692, Wil- 
liam and Mary College was established at Williamsburg.' Harvard College, at 
Cambridge, Massachusetts, was founded in 1637. Yale College, in Connecti- 
cut, was established at Saybrook in 1701,* and was removed to its present loca- 
tion, in New Haven, in 1717. It was named in honor of Elihu Yale, pres- 
ident of the East India Company, and one of its most liberal benefactors. The 
college of New Jersey, at Princeton, called Nassau Hall, was incorporated in 
1738 f and King's (now Columbia) College, in the city of New York, was 
foudned in 1750. The college of Philadelphia was incorporated in 1760. 
The college of Rhode Island (now Brown University) was established at War- 
ren in 1764. Queen's (now Rutger s) College, in New Jersey, was founded 
in 1770; and Dartmouth College, at Hanover, New Hamshire, was opened in 



A law was enacted in 1750, which prohibited the "erection or contrivance of any mill or other 

engine for slitting or rolling iron, or any plating forge to work with a tilt-hammer, or any furnac* 
for making steel in the colonies." Such was the condition of manufacturera in the United States 
one hundred years ago. Notwithstanding we are eminenily an agricultural people, the census of 
1H70 showed that we had, in round numbers, $2,000,000,000 invested in manufactures. The value 
of raw material was estimated at $2,400,000,000. The amount paid for labor during that year, 
was nearly $700,000,000, distributed among 2,000.000 operatives. The value of manufactured 
articles was estimated at more than $4,000,000,000. Fully 20 per cent, must be added for 1880. 

' For a hundred years the British government attempted to confine the commerce of the colo- 
nies to the interchange of their a.i;rieultural products for English manufactures only. The trade of the 
growing colonies was certainly worth sectiring. From 1738 to 1748, tlie average value of exports 
from Great Britain to the American colonies, was almost three and a quarter millions of dollars 
annually. 

' The schools previously established did not flourish, and the funds appropriated for their sup- 
port were given to the college. 

* In 1700, ten ministers of the colony met at Saybrook, and each contributed books for the 
establishment of a college. It was incorporated in 1701. See note 8, page 158. 

* It was a feeble institution at first. In 1747, Governor Belcher became its patron. 



1756.] THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 179 

1771. It will be seen that the colonies could boast of no less than nine col- 
leges when the War for Independence commenced — three of them under the 
^supervision of Episcopalians, three under Congregationalists, one each under 
Presbyterians, the Reformed Dutch Church, and the Baptists. But the pride 
and glorj of New England have ever been its common schools. Those received 
the earliest and most earnest attention. In 1636, the Connecticut Legislature 
•enacted a law which required every town that contained fifty families, to main- 
tain a good school, and every town containing one hundred householders, to 
have a grammar school.' Similar provisions for general education • soon pre- 
vailed throughout Ncav England ; and the people became remarkable for their 
intelligence. The rigid laws which discouraged all frivolous amusements, 
induced active minds, during leisure hours, to engage in reading. The sub- 
jects contained in books then in general circulation, were chiefly History and 
Theology, and of these a great many \r3re sold. A traveler mentions the fact, 
that, as early as 1686, several booksellers in Boston had " made fortunes by 
their business."^ But newspapers, the great vehicle of general intelligence to 
the popular mind of our day, were very few and of little worth, before the era 
of the Revolution.' 

Such, in brief and general outline^ were the American people, and such their 
political and social condition, at the commencement of the last inter-colonial 
Avar, which we are now to consider, during which they discovered their strength, 
the importance of a continental union, and their real independence of Greai 
Britain. 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. [1756—1763.] 

We are now to consider one of the most important episodes in the history 
of the United States, known in Europe as the Seven Years' War, and in 

* These townships were, in general, organized religious communities, and had many interests in 
common. 

* Previous to 1753, there had been seventy booksellers in Massachusetts, two in New Hamp- 
shire, two iH Connecticut, one in Rhode Island, two in New York, and seventeen in Pennsylvania* 

' The first newspaper ever printed in Amei'ica was the Boston News Letter, printed in 1704 
The next was established in PhUatlelphia, in 1719. The first in New York was in 1725 ; in Mary- 
land, in 1728 ; in South Carolina, in 1731 ; in Rhode Island, in 1732 ; in Virginia, in 1736 ; in New 
Hampshire, in 1753; in Connecticut, in 1755; in Delaware, in 1761; in North Caiolina, in 1763; 
in Georgia, in 1763; and in New Jersey, in 1777. In 1875, there were published in the United 
StafeR. 6,793 newspapers and maa-azines. liavinsr a circulation of 2,000,000,000 of copies annually. 

■• We have no exact enumeration of the iuhabitauts of the colonies; but Mr. Bancroft, after a 
careftil examination of many official returns and private computations, estimates the nimiber of 
white people in the colonies, at the commencement of the French and Indian War, to have been 
about 1,165,000, distributed as follows: In New England (N. H., Mass., R. I., and Conn.), 425,000; 
in the middle colonies (N. Y., N. J., Penn., Del., and Md.), 457,000 ; and in the southern colonies 
(Va., N. and S. Carolina, and Geo.), 283,000. The estimated number of slaves, 260,000, of whom 
about 11,000 were in New England; middle colonies, 71,000; and the southern colonies, 178,000. 
Of the 1,165,000 white people. Dr. Franklin estimated that only about 80,000 were of foreign birth, 
showing the fact that emigration to America had almost ceased. At the beginning of the Revoltt 
tion, in 1775, the estimated population of the thirteen colonies was 2,803,000. The documents d 
■ Congress, in 1775, gives the round number of 3,000,000. 



180 THE COLONIES. [1756;. 

America as the Frexch and Indian War. It may with propriety be con- 
sidered introductory to the War for Independence, which resulted in the birtk 
of our Republic. The first three inter-colonial wars, or the conflicts in America^ 
between the English and French colonies, already noticed,' originated in hostil- 
ities first declared by the two governments, and commenced in Europe. The. 
fourth and last, which resulted in establishing the supremacy of the English in^^ 
America, originated here in disputes concerning territorial claims. For a hun- 
dred years, the colonies of the two nations had been gradually expanding andi 
increasing in importance. The English, more than a million in number, occu- 
pied the seaboard from the Penobscot to the St. Mary, a thousand miles in- 
extent, all eastward of the great ranges of the Alleghanies, and far northward ^ 
toward the St. Lawrence. The French, not more than a hundred thousand 
strong, made settlements along the St. Lawrence, the shores of the great lakes, 
on the Mississippi and its tributaries, and upon the borders of the Gulf of Mex- 
ico. They early founded Detroit [1683], Kaskaskia [1684], Vincennes [1690]^ 
and New Orleans [1717]. The English planted agricultural colonies; the- 
French were chiefly engaged in trafiic with the Indians. This trade, and the 
operations of the Jesuit^ missionaries, who were usually the self-denying pio- 
neers of commerce in its penetration of the wilderness, gave the French great 
influence over the tribes of a vast extent of country lying in the rear of the 
English settlements. 3 

France and England at that time were heirs to an ancient quarrel. Ori^n-. 
•ting far back in feudal ages, and kept alive by subsequent collisions, it burned 
rigorously in the bosoms of the respective colonists in America, where it was 
continually fed by frequent hostilities on frontier ground. They had ever 
regarded each other with extreme jealousy, for the prize before them was. 
supreme rule in the New World. The trading posts and missionary stations- 
of the French, in the far north-west, and in the bosom of a dark wilderness, 
several hundred miles distant from the most remote settlement on the English, 
frontier, attracted very little attention, until they formed a part of more exten- 
sive operations. But when, after the capture of Louisburg,'' in 1745, the French 
adopted vigorous measures for opposing the extension of British power in Amer^ 
ica: when they built strong vessels at the foot of Lake Ontario'' — made treaties 
of friendship with the Delaware* and Shawnee' tribes ; strengthened Fort Niag- 
ara ;' and erected a cordon of fortifications, more than sixty in number, between. 
Montreal and New Orleans — the English were aroused to immediate and effective 
action in defense of the territorial claims given them in their ancient charters. 
By virtue of these, they claimed dominion westward to the Pacific Ocean, south 
of the latitude of the north shore of Lake Erie ; while the French claimed a title 
to all the territory watered by the Mississippi and its tributaries, under the 
more plausible plea, that they had made the first explorations and settlements 

' King WiUiam^s War (page 130); Queen Anne^s War (page 135); and King George's War (page- 
136). * Note 4, page 130. ' Chiefly of the Algonquin nation. Page 17. 

* Page 138. * At Fort Frontenac, now Kingston, Upper Canada. 

• Page 20. ' Page 19. » Page 200. 



n63.] THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 181 

in that region.' The claims of the real owner, the Indian, were lost sight of 
in the discussion.^ 

These disputes soon ended in action. The territorial question was speedily 
brought to an issue. In 1749, George the Second granted six hundred thou- 
sand acres of land, on the south-east bank of the Ohio River, to a company 
composed of London merchants and Virginia land speculators, with the exclusive 
privilege of traffic with the Indians. It was called The Ohio Company. 
Surveyors were soon sent to explore, and make boundaries, and prepare for 
settlements; and English traders went even as far as the country of the 
Miamies^ to traffic with the natives. The French regarded them as intruders, 
and, in 1753, seized and imprisoned some of them. Apprehending the loss of 
traffic and influence among the Indians, and the ultimate destruction of their 
line of communication between Canada and Louisiana, the French commenced 
the erection of forts between the Alleghany River and Lake Erie, near the 
present western line of Pennsylvania.* The Ohio Company complained of 
these hostile movements ; and as their grant lay within the chartered limits of 
Virginia, the authorities of that colony considered it their duty to interfere. 
Robert Dinwiddle, the lieutenant-governor, sent a letter of remonstrance to M. 
De St. Pierre, the French commander.^ George Washington was chosen to be 
the bearer of the dispatch. He was a young man, less than twenty-two years 
of age, but possessed much experience of forest life. He already held the com- 
mission of adjutant-general of one of the four militia districts of Virginia. 
From early youth he had been engaged in land surveying, had become accus- 
tomed to the dangers and hardships of the wilderness, and was acquainted with 
the character of the Indians, and of the country he was called upon to traverse. 

Young Washington, as events proved, was precisely the instrument needed 
for such a service. His mission involved much personal peril and hardship. 
It required the courage of the soldier, and the sagacity of the statesman, to 
perform the duty properly. The savage tribes through which he had to pass, 
were hostile to the English, and the French he was sent to meet were national 
•enemies, wily and suspicious. With only two or three attendants," Washington 
started from Williamsburg late in autumn [Oct. 31, 1753], and after journey- 
ing full four hundred miles (more than half the distance through a dark wilder- 
ness), encountering almost incredible hardships, amid snow, and icy floods, and 
hostile Indians, he reached the French outpost at Venango on the 4th of De- 

' Page 180. 

^ "When the agent of the Ohio Company went into the Indian country, on the borders of the 
Ohio River, a messenger was sent by two Indian sachems, to make the significant inquiry. "Where 
is the Indian's land ? The English claim it all on one side of the river, the French on the other; 
where does the Indian's land lay?" ^ Page 19. 

* Twelve hundred men erected a fort on the south shore of Lake Erie, at Presque Isle, now 
Erie ; soon afterward, another was built at Le BoeufJ on the Venango (French Creek), now the vil- 
lage of Waterford; and a third was erected at Venango, at the junction of French Creek and the 
Alleghany River, now the village of Franklin. 

^ Already the governors of Virginia and Pennsylvania had received orders from the imperial 
government, to repel the French by force, whenever they were " found within the undoubted limits 
of then- province." 

° He was afterward joined by two others at Wills' Creek (now Cumberland), in Maryland. 



182 THE COLONIES. [llSff. 

cember. He was politely received, and his visit was made the occasion of great 
conviviality by the officers of the garrison. The free use of wine made the 
Frenchmen incautious, and they revealed to the sober Washington their hostile 
designs against the English, which the latter had suspected. He perceived the 
necessity of dispatching business, and returning to Williamsburg, as speedily 
as possible ; so, after tarrying a day at Venango, he pushed forward to the 
head-quarters of St. Pierre, at Le Boeuf. That officer entertained him politely 
during four days, and then gave him a written answer to Dinwiddle's remon- 
strance, enveloped and sealed. Washington retraced his perilous pathway 
through the wilderness, and after an absence of eleven weeks, he again stood in 
the |)resence of Governor Dinwiddle, on the 16th of January, 1754, his mission 
fulfilled to the satisfaction of all. His judgment, sagacity, courage, and execu- 
tive force — qualities which eminently fitted him for the more important duties 
as chief of the Revolutionary armies, more than twenty years afterward [1775] 
— were nobly developed in the performance of his mission. They were publicly 
acknowledged, and were never forgotten. 

Already the Virginians were restive under royal rule, and at that time 
were complaining seriously of an obnoxious fee allowed by the Board of Trade, 
in the issue of patents for lands. The House of Burgesses refused, at first, to 
pay any attention to Dinwiddle's complaints against the French ; but at length 
they voted fifty thousand dollars for the support of troops which had been 
enlisted to march into the Ohio country. The revelations made to Washington, 
and the tenor of St. Pierre's reply, confirmed the suspicions of Dinwiddle, and 
showed the wisdom of the legislative co-operation. St. Pierre said he Avas acting 
in obedience to the orders of his superior, the Marquis Du Quesne,* at Montreal, 
and refused to withdraw his troops from the disputed territory. Dinwiddle 
immediately prepared an expedition against the French, and solicited the co-op- 
eration of the other colonies. It was the first call for a general colonial union 
against a common enemy. All hesitated except North Carolina. The legisla- 
ture of that colony promptly voted four hundred men, and they were soon on 
the march for Winchester, in Virginia. They eventually proved of little use, 
for becoming doubtful as to their pay, a greater part of them had disbanded 
before reaching Winchester. Some volunteers from South Carolina and New 
York, also hastened toward the seat of future war. The Virginians responded , 
to the call, and a regiment of six hundred men was soon organized, with Colonel 
Joshua Fry as its commander, and Major Washington as his lieutenant. The 
troops rendezvoused at Alexandria, and from that city, Washington, at the head 
of the advanced corps, marched [April 2, 1754] toward the Ohio. 

Private and public interest went hand in hand. While these mihtary prep- 
arations were in progress, the Ohio Comjmny had sent thirty men to construct 
a fort at the confluence of the Alleghany and Monongahela Rivers, now the site of 
Pittsburg. They had just commenced operations [April 18], when a party of 
French and Indians, under Contrecoeur, attacked and expelled them, completed 

* Pronounced Du Kane. 



1763.] THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 183 

the fortification, and named it Du Quesne, in honor of the governor-general of 
Canada.' When intelligence of this event reached Washington on his march, 
he hastened forward with one hundred and fifty men, to a point on the Monon- 
gahela, less than forty miles from Fort Du Quesne. There ho was informed 
that a strong force was marching to intercept him, and he cautiously fled back 
to the Great Meadows, where he erected a stockade,^ and called it Fort Neces- 
sity.' Before completing it, a few of his troops attacked an advanced party of 
the French, under Jumonvifle. They were surprised on the morninf? of 
May 28, and the commander and nine of his men were slain. Of the fiflv 
who formed the French detachment, only about fifteen escaped. This was the 
first blood-shedding of that long and eventful conflict known as the French and 
Indian War. Two days afterward [May 30], Colonel Fry died, and the 
whole command devolved on Washington. Troops hastened f-^rward to join the 
young leader at Fort Necessity, and with about four hundred men, he proceeded 
toward Fort Du Quesne. M. de Villiers, brother of the slain Jumonville, had 
marched at about the same time, at the head of more than a thousand Indians 
and some Frenchmen, to avenge the death of his kinsman. Advised of his 
approach, Washington fell back to Fort Necessity, and there, on the 3d of July, 
he was attacked by almost eiglit hundred foes. After a conflict of about ten 
hours, de Villiers proposed an honorable capitulation." Washington sio-ned it 
on the morning of the 4th, and marching out of the stockade with the honors 
of war, departed, with his troops, for Virginia. 

It was during this military campaign, that a civil movement of great import- 
ance was in progress. The English and French governments had listened to 
the disputes in America with interest. At length the British ministry, per- 
ceiving war to be inevitable, advised the colonies to secure the continued 
friendship of the Six Nations," and to unite in a plan for general defense. 
All the colonies were invited to appoint delegates to meet in convention at 
Albany, in the summer of 1754. Only seven responded by sending delegates." 
The convention was organized on the 19th of June. ^ Having renewed a treaty 
with the Indians, the subject of colonial union was brought forward. A plan 
of confederation, similar to our Federal Constitution, drawn up by Dr. Franklin, 
was submitted.* It was adopted on the 10th of July, 1754, and Avas ordered to 
be laid before the several colonial Assemblies, and the imperial Board of Trade,' 

' Page 182. ~ 

^ Stockade is a general name of stniftnrcs for defense, formed by driving strong posts in the 

ground, so as to make a safe inclosure. It is the same as a palisade. See picture on 'page 127. 
' Near the national road from Cumberland to Wlieeling, in the south-eastern part of Fayette 

county, Pennsylvania. The Great Meadows are on a fertile bottom about four miles from the foot 

of Laurel Hill, and fifty from Cumberland. 

* A mutual restoration of prisoners was to take place, and the English were not to erect any 
establishment beyond tlie mountains, for the space of a year. The English troops were to marcli, 
unmolested, back to Virginia. 6 p^ge 25. 

* New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, and 
Maryland. 

' James Delancy, of New York was elected president. There were twenty-five delegates in all. 

* Franklin was a delegate from Pennsylvania. The idea of union was not a new one. William 
Penn suggested the advantage of a union of all the English colonies as early as 1700; and Coxe, 
Speaker of the New Jersey Assembly, advocated it in 1722. Now it first found tangible expressioa 
under the sanction of authority. » Note 5, page 134. 



184 THE COLONIES. [1756. 

for ratification.' Its flxte was singular. The Assemblies considering it too 
aristocratic — giving the royal governor too much power — refused their assent ; 
and the Board of Trade rejected it because it was too democratic? Although 
a legal union was not consummated, the grand idea of political fraternization 
then began to bud. It blossomed in the midst of the heat of the Stamp Act 
excitement eleven years later [1765], and its fruit appeared in the memorable 
Congress of 1774. 

The convention at Albany had just closed its labors, when the Indians com- 
menced murderous depredations upon the New England frontiers [August and 
September, 1754] ; and among the tribes west of the Alleghanies, French emis- 
saries were busy arousing them to engage in a war of extermination against the 
English. Even in full view of these menaces, some of the colonies were tardy 
in preparations to avert the evil. Shirley was putting forth energetic efforts in 
Massachusetts ; New York voted twenty-five thousand dollars for military serv- 
ice, and Maryland thirty thousand dollars for the same. The English govern- 
ment sent over fifty thousand dollars for the use of the colonists, and with it a 
commission to Governor Sharpe of Maryland, appointing him commander-in- 
chief of all the colonial forces. Disputes about military rank and precedence 
soon ran high between the Virginia regimental officers, and the captains of 
independent companies. To silence these, Dinwiddle unwisely dispensed with 
all field officers, and broke the A^irginia regiments into separate companies. This 
arrangement displeased Washington ; he resigned his commission, and the year 
1754 drew to a close without any efficient preparations for a conflict with the 
Erench.' 

CAMPAIGN OF 1755. 

Yet war had not been declared by the two nations ; and for more than a 
year and a half longer the colonies were in conflict, before England and France 
formally announced hostility to each other. In the mean while the British 
government, perceiving that a contest, more severe than had yet been seen, 
must soon take place in America, extended its aid to its colonies. Edward 
Braddock, an Irish officer of distinction, arrived in Chesapeake Bay, with two 
regiments of his countrymen, on the 20th of February, 1755. He had been 

' It proposed a general government to be administered by one chief magistrate, to be appointed 
by the crown, and a council of forty-eight members, chosen by the several legislatures. This coun- 
cU, answering to our Senate, was to have power to declare war, levy troops, raise money, regulate 
trade, conclude peace, and many other things necessary for the general good. The delegates from 
Cormecticut alone, objected to the plan, because it gave the governor-general veto power, or the 
right to refuse his signature to laws ordained by the Senate, and thus prevent them becoming stat- 
utes. 

" The Board of Trade had proposed a plan which contained all the elements of a system for the 
utter enslavement and dependence of the Americans. They proposed a general government, composed 
of the governors of the several colonies, and certain select members of the several councils. These 
were to have power to draw on the British Treasury for money to carrv on the impendmg war : the 
sum to be reimbursed by taxes imposed upon the colonists by Parliament. The colonists preferred 
to do their own fighting, and levy their own taxes, independent of Great Britain. 

^ According to a return made to the Board of Trade at about this time, the population of tlK- colo- 
nies amounted to one million four hundred and eighty-five thousand, six hundred and thirty-four. 
Of these, two hundred and ninety-two thousand seven hundred and thirty-eight were : 



1763,] THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 185 

appointed commander-in-chief of all the British and provincial forces in Amer- 
ica ; and at his request, six colonial governors' met in convention at Alexandria, 
in April following, to assist in making arrangements for a vigorous campaign. 
Three separate expeditions were planned ; one against Fort du Quesne, to be 
led by Braddock;'a second against Niagara and Frontenac (Kingston), to be 
commanded by Governor Shirley ; and a third against Crown Point, on Lake 
Champlain, under General William Johnson,* then an influential resident among 
the Mohawk nation of the Iroquois confederacy." Already a fourth expedition 
had been arranged by Shirley and Governor Lawrence of Nova Scotia, designed 
to drive the French out of that province, and other portions of ancient Acadie.* 
These extensive arrangements, sanctioned by the imperial government, awakened 
the most zealous patriotism of all the colonists, and the legislatures of the sev- 
eral provinces, except Pennsylvania and Georgia, voted men and supplies for 
the impending war. The Quaker Assembly of Pennsylvania was opposed to 
military movements ; the people of Georgia were too poor to contribute. 

There was much enthusiasm in New England, and the eastern expedition 
first proceeded to action. Three thousand men, under General John Winslow,' 
sailed from Boston on the 20th of May, 1755, and landed at the head of the 
Bay of Fundy. There they were joined by Colonel Monckton with three hun- 
dred British regulars' from the neighboring garrison, and that officer, having 
official precedence of Winslow, took the command. They captured the forts in 
possession of the French there, in June, without difficulty, and placed the whole 
region under martial rule.^ This was the legitimate result of war. But the 
•cruel sequel deserves universal reprobation. The total destruction of the French 
settlements was decided upon. Under the plea that the Acadians would aid 
their French brethren in Canada, the innocent and happy people were seized in 
their houses, fields, and churches, and conveyed on board the English vessels. 
Families were broken, never to be united ; and to compel the surrender of those 
who fled to the woods, their starvation was insured by a total destruction of 
their growing crops. The Acadians were stripped of every thing, and those 
who were carried away, were scattered among the English colonies, helpless 
beggars, to die heart-broken in a strange land. In one short month, their 
paradise had become a desolation, and a happy people were crushed into the dust. 

The western expedition, under Braddock, was long delayed on account of 
-difficulties in obtaining provisions and wagons. The patience of the commander 
was sorely tried, and in moments of petulance he used expressions against the 
colonists, which they long remembered Avith bitterness. He finally commenced 
his march from Will's Creek (Cumberland) on the 10th of June, 1755, with 
about two thousand men, British and provincials. Anxious to reach Fort du 

' Shirley, of Massachusetts ; Din-widdie, of Virginia ; Delancey, of New York ; Sharpe, of Mary- 
land ; Morris, of Pennsylvania ; and Dobbs, of North Carolina. Admiral Keppel, commander of the 
British fleet, was also present. ' ' Page 190. ' Page 25. " Page 58. 

^ He was a great grandson of Edward Winslow, the third governor of Plymouth. He was a 
major-general in the Massachusetts militia, but on this occasion held the office of lieutenant-colonel. 

" This term is used to denote soldiers who are attached to the regular army, and as distinguished 
from volunteers and militia. The latter term applies to the great body of citizens who are liable ta 
40 perpetual military duty only in time of war. ' Note 8, page 170. 



186 



THE coloxie; 



[1756.. 




FORT DU QTTESNE. 



Quesne before the garrison should receive re-inforcements, he made forced 
marches with twelve hundred men, leaving Colonel Dunbar, 
his second in command, to follow with the remainder, and 
the wagons. Colonel Washington' had consented to act aa 
Braddock's aid, and to him was given the command of the 
provincials. Knowing, far better than Braddock, the perils 
of their march and the kind of warfare thej might expect, he 
ventured, modestly, to give advice, founded upon his experi- 
ence. But the haughty general would listen to no suggestions, 
especially from a provincial subordinate. This obstinacy resulted in his ruin. 
When Avithin ten miles of Fort du Quesne, and while marching at noon-day, on 
the 9th of July, in fancied security, on the north side of the Monongahela, a 
volley of bullets and a cloud of arrows assailed the advanced guard, under 
Lieutenant-Colonel Gage.^ They came from a thicket and ravine close by, 
where a thousand dusky warriors lay in ambush. Again Washington asked 
permission to fight according to the provincial custom, but was refused. 
Braddock must maneuver according to European tactics, or not at all. For 
three hours, deadly volley after volley fell upon the British columns, while 
Braddock attempted to maintain order, where all was confusion. The slain 
soon covered the ground. Every mounted officer but Washington was killed or 
maimed, and finally, the really brave Braddock himself, after having several 
horses shot under him, was mortally wounded.^ Washington remained unhurt.^ 
Under his direction the provincials rallied, while the regulars, seeing their gen- 
eral fall, were fleeing in great confusion. The provincials covered their retreat 
so gallantly, that the enemy did not follow. A week after- 
ward, Washington read the impressive funeral service of the 
Anglican Church,^ over the corpse of Braddock, by torch- 
light [July 15, 1755] ; and he was buried, where his grave 
may novf [1867] be seen, near the National road, between the 
fifty-third and fifty-fourth mile from Cumberland, in Mary- 
land. Colonel Dunbar received the flying troops, and marched 
to Philadel|)hia in August, Avith the broken companies. Wash- 
ington, with the southern provincials, went back to Virginia. 
Thus ended the second expedition of the campaign of 1755. 

' Page 181. ^ Afterward General Gage, commander-in-chief of the British troops at 

Boston, at the beginning of the Revolution. Page 226. 

^ Braddock was shot by Thomas Faucett, one of tlie provincial soldiers. His plea was self- 
preservation. Braddock had issued a positive order, that none of the English should protect tliem- 
selves behind trees, as the French and Indians did Faucett's brother had taken such position, and 
when Braddock perceived it, he struck him to the earth with his sword. Thomas, on seeing his 
brother fall, shot Braddock in the back, and then the provincials, fighting as they pleased, were 
saved from utter destruction. 

* Dr. Craik, who was with "Washington at this time, and also attended him in his last illness, 
says, that while in the Ohio country with him, fifteen years afterward, an old Indian chief came, aa 
he said, " a long way" to see the Virginia colonel at whom he fired his rifle fifteen times during the 
battle on the Monongahela, without hitting him. Washington was never wounded in battle. On 
this occasion he had two horses shot under him. and four bullets passed through his coat. Writing- 
of this to his brother, he remarked, " By the all-powerftil dispensations of Providence, I have been 
protected beyond all human probability or expectation, * * * although death was leveling my 
companions on every side." ' Note 1, page 168. See picture on page 187. 




GEX. BRADDOCK. 




Burial op Buaduook. 



1763.] THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 189 

The third expedition, under Governor Shirley, designed to operate against 
the French posts at Niagara and Frontenac, experienced less disasters, but was 
quite as unsuccessful. It was late in August before Shirley had collected the 
main body of his troops at Oswego, from whence he intended to go to Niagara 
by water. His force was twenty -five hundred strong on the 1st of September, 
yet circumstances compelled him to hesitate. The prevalence of storms, and 
of sickness in his camp, and, finally, the desertion of the greater part of his 
Indian allies,' made it perilous to proceed, and he relinquished the design. 
Leaving sufficient men to garrison the forts which he had commenced at 
Oswego,' he marched the remainder to Albany [Oct. 24], and returned to 
Massachusetts. 

The fourth expedition, under General Johnson, prepared for attacking 
Crown Point, ^ accomplished more than that of Braddock' or Shirley, but failed 
to achieve its main object. In July [1755], about six thousand troopa, 
drawn from New England, New York, and New Jersey, had assembled at the 
head of boat navigation on the Hudson (now the village of Fort Edward), fifty 
miles north of Albany. They were under the command of General Lyman,* 
of Connecticut ; and before the arrival of General Johnson, in August, with 
cannons and stores, they had erected a strong fortification, which was afterward 
called Fort Edward.^ On his arrival, Johnson took command, and with th& 
main body of the troops, marched to the head of Lake George, about fifteen 
miles distant, where he established a camp, protected on both sides by an im- 
passable swamp. 

"While the provincial troops were making these preparations, General the 
Baron Dieskau (a French officer of much repute), with about two thousand 
men, chiefly Canadian militia and Indians, was approaching from Montreal, 
by way of Lake Champlain, to meet the English.^ When Johnson arrived at 
Lake George, on the 7th of September, Indian scouts informed him that Dies- 
kau was disembarking at the head of Lake Champlain (now the village of 

' Tribes of the Six Nations [page 25], and some Stockbridge Indians. The latter were called 
Housatonics, from the river on which they were found. They were a division of the Mohegan 
[page 21] tribe. 

' Fort Ontario on the east, and Fort Pepperell on the west of Oswego River. Fort Pepperell 
was afterward called Fort Oswego. See map, page 192. The house was built of stone, and the 
walls were three feet thick. It was within a square inclosure composed of a thick wall, and two 
strong square towers. 

' Upon this tongue of land on Lake Champlain, the French erected a fortification, which they 
called Fort St. Frederick. On the Vermont side of the lake, opposite, there was a French settle- 
ment as early as 1731. In allusion to the chimiiies of their houses, which remained long after tha 
settlement was destroyed, it is still known as Chimney Point. 

♦ Page 185. 

* Bom in Durham, Connecticut, in the year 1716. He was a graduate of Tale College, and be- 
came a lawyer. He was a member of the colonial Assembly in 1750, and performed important 
services during the whole war that soon afterward ensued. He commanded the expedition that 
captured Havana in 1762; and at the peace, in 1763, he became concerned in lands in the Missis- 
sippi region. He died in Florida in 1775. 

' It was first called Fort Lyman. Johnson, meanly jealous of General Lyman, changed the 
name to Fort Edward. 

' Dieskau and his French troops, on their way from France, narrowly escaped capture by Ad- 
miral Boscawen, who was cruising, with an English fleet, ofif Newfoundland. They eluded his fleet 
during a fog, and went in safety up the St. Lawrence. 



190 



THE COLONIES. 



[175«. 




Whitehall), preparatory to marching against Fort Edward. The next scouts 
brought Johnson the intelligence that Dieskau's Indians, 
terrified by the English cannons when they approached 
Fort Edward, had induced him to change his plans, and 
that he was marching to attack his camp. Colonel 
Ephraim Williams, of Deerfield, Massachusetts, was imme- 
diately sent [Sept. 8J, with a thousand troops from that 
colony, and two hundred Mohawk^,' under the famous chief, 

^_^ _^ ^^^ Hendrick, to intercept the enemy. They met in a narrow 

k^ lm'"^^^^^ defile, four miles from Lake George. The English sud- 
r.nT.-n r.T.w.T,r^ dculv fcll into an ambuscade. Williams and Hendrick 

were both killed,'^ and their followers fell back in great con- 
fusion, upon Johnson's camp, hotly pursued by the victors. One of the Mas- 
sachusetts regiments, which fought bravely in this action, was commanded by 
Timothy Ruggles, who was president of the Stamp Act Congress,^ held at New 
York in 1765, but who, when the Revolution broke out, was active on the side 
of the Crown. 

The commander-in-chief was assure<l of the disaster before the flying fugi- 
tives made their appearance. He immediately cast up a breastwork of logs and 
limbs, placed upon it two canr^is which he had received from Fort Edward 
two days before, and when the enemy came rushing on, 
close upon the heels of the English, he was prepared to 
receive them. The fugitives had just reached Johnson's 
camp when Dieskau and his flushed victors appeared. 
Unsuspicious of heavy guns upon so rude a pile as John- 
son's battery exhibited, they rushed forward, with sword, 
pike, and tomahawk, and made a spirited attack. One 
volley from the English cannons made the Indians flee in 
terror to the shelter of the deep forests around. The Ca- 
nadian militia also fled, as General Lyman and a body of 
troops approached from Fort Edward ; and, finally^ the French troops, after 
continuing the conflict several hours, and losing their commander,^ withdrew, 
and hastened to Crown Point. Their baggage was captured by some New 
Hampshire troops from Fort Edward, and the defeat was complete. 

General Johnson erected a fortification on the site of his camp, at the head 
of the lake, and called it Fort William Henry. It was constructed under the 
direction of Richard Gridley,'who commanded the artillery in the siege of 
Louisburg, ten years before.^ Being informed that the French were strength- 




SIR WILLIAM JOHNSON. 



' Page 23. 

* WhQe on his way north, Williams stopped at Albany, made his will, and bequeathed certain 
property to found a free school for western Massachusetts. That was the foundation of "Williams' 
College" — his best monument. The rock near which his body was found, on the right side of the 
road from Glenn's Falls to Lake George, still bears his name ; and a collection of water on the bat- 
tle-ground, is called Bloody Pond. ' Page 215. 

* Dieskau was found mortally wounded, carried into the English camp, and there tenderly 
treated. He was afterward conveyed to New York, from whence he sailed to England, where ho 
died. * Note 1, page 137. 



1763.] 



THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 



191 



ening their works at Crown Point, and were fortifying Ticonderoga,' he thought 

it prudent to cease offensive operations. He garrisoned Fort Edward and Fort 

William Henrj, returned to Albany, and as the season was 

advanced [October, 1755 J, he dispersed the remainder of his 

troops. For his services in this campaign, the king conferred 

the honor of knighthood upon him, and gave him twenty-five 

thousand dollars with which to support the dignity. This 

honor and emolument properly belonged to General Lyman, 

the real hero of the campaign.^ Johnson had Sir Peter Warren 

and other friends at court, and so won the unmerited prize. 




FORT WILLIAM 
HENKY. 



CAMPAIGN OF 11 



The home governments now took up the quarrel. The campaign of 1755, 
having assumed all the essential features of regular war, and there appearing 
no prospect of reconciliation of the belligerents, England formally proclaimed 
hostilities against France, on the 17th of May, 1756, and the latter soon after- 
ward [June 9] reciprocrated the action. Governor 
Shirley, who had become commander-in chief, after the 
death of Braddock, wa& superseded by General Aber- 
crombie^ in the spring of 1756. He came as the lieu- 
tenant of Lord Loudon, whom the king had appointed 
to the chief command in America, and also governor of 
Virginia. Loudon was an indolent man, and a remark- 
able procrastinater, and the active general-in-chief was 
Abercrombie, who, also, was not remarkable for his 
skill and forethought as a commander. He arrived 
with several British regiments early in June. The 
plan of the campaign for that year had already been arranged by a convention 
of colonial governors held at Albany early in the season.' Ten thousand men 
were to attack Crown Point;'' six thousand were to proceed against Niagara;* 
three thousand against Fort du Quesne f and two thousand were to cross the 
country from the Kennebec, to attack the French settlements on the Chaudiere 
River. 

The command of the expedition against Crown Point was intrusted to Gen- 
eral Winslow,^ who had collected seven thousand men at Albany, when Aber- 




ABERCROMBIE. 



! Pag3 196. 

' Lyman urged Johnson to pursue the French, and assail Crown Point. The Mohawks burned 
for an opportunity to avenge the death of Hendriek. But Johnson preferred ease and safety, and 
spent the autumn in constructing Fort Wilham Henry. He meanly witliheld all praise from Ly- 
man, in his dispatches to government. Johnson was born in Ireland, in 1714. He came to Amer- 
ica to take charge of the lands of his uncle, Admiral Warren [page 137], on the Mohawk River, 
and gained great influence over the Indians of New York. He died at his seat (now the villaga 
of Johnstown) in the Mohawk valley, in 1774. 

^ A strong party in England, irritated by the failures of the campaign of 1755, cast the blame 
of BraddoL'k's defeat and other disasters, upon the Americans, and finally procured the recall of 
Shirley. He completely vindicated his character, and was afterward appointed governor of the 
Bahama Islands. * Page 200. * Page 200. ^ Page 186. ' Page 185. 



192 



THE COLONIES. 



[r,56. 



crombie arrived. Difficulties immediately occurred, respecting military rank,, 
and caused delay. They were not adjusted when the tardy Loudon arrived, at 
midsummer ; and his arrogant assumption of superior rank for the royal oflBcers, 
increased the irritation and discontent of the provincial troops. When these 
matters were finally adjusted, in August, the French had gained such positive 
advantages, that the whole plan of the campaign was disconcerted. 

Baron Dieskau' was succeeded by the Marquis de Montcalm, in the com- 
mand of the French troops in Canada. Perceiving the delay of the English, 
and knowing that a large number of their troops was at Albany, short of pro- 
visions, and suffering from small -pox, and counting wisely upon the inefficiency 
of their commander-in-chief, he collectsd about five thousand Frenchmen, Ca- 
nadians, and Indians, at Frontenac,*^ and crossing Lake Ontario, landed, with 
thirty pieces of cannon, a few miles east of Oswego. Two days afterward, he 
appeared before Fort Ontario [Aug. 11, 1756], on the east side of the river, 
then in command of Colonel Mercer. After a short but brave resistance, the 
garrison abandoned the fort [Aug. 12], and withdrew to an older fortification, 
on the west side of the river.^ Their commander was killed, and they were 
soon obliged to surrender themselves [Aug. 14] prisoners 
of war. The spoils of victory for Montcalm, were four- 
teen hundred prisoners, a large amount of military stores, 
consisting of small arms, ammunition, and provisions ; one 
hundred and thirty-four pieces of cannon, and several ves- 
sels, large and small, in the harbor. After securing them, 
he demolished the forts, ^ and returned to Canada. The 
whole country of the Six Nations was now laid open to 
the incursions of the French. 
The loss of Oswego was a severe blow to the English. When intelligence 
of that event reached Loudon, he recalled the troops then on their way toward 
Lake Champlain ; and all the other expeditions were abandoned. Forts Wil- 
liam Henry^ and Edward^ were strengthened ; fifteen hundred volunteers and 
drafted militia, under Washington, were placed in stockades' for the defense of 
the Pennsylvania and Virginia frontiers ; and on the western borders of the 
Carolinas several military posts were established as a protection against the 



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FOKTS AT OSWEGO. 



' Page 189, " Note 5, page 180. 

* A palisaded block-house, built by order of Governor Burnet in 
1727, near the spot where Fort Pepperell was erected. A redoubt 
or block-house is a fortified building, of peculiar construction, well cal- 
culated for defense. They were generally built of logs, in the form 
represented in the engraving. They were usually two stories, with 
narrow openings through which to fire muskets from within. They 
were sometimes prepared with openings for cannons. 

* This was to please the Six Nations, who had never felt con 
tented with this supporter of power in their midst. The demolition 
of these forts, induced the Indians to assume an attitude of neutrality, 
by a solemn treaty. 

* Page 191. It commanded a view of the lake from its head ta 
the Narrows, fifteen miles. 

• Page 190. The Hudson is divided at Fort Edward, mto two channels, by Roger's Island,. 
;pon which the provincial troops out of the fort, usually encamped. ' Note 2, page 183. 




BLOCK house. 



1763.] THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 193 

Cherokees' and Creeks,' whom French emissaries were exciting to hostilities 
against the English. Hitherto, since the commencement of hostilities, some of 
the colonial Assemblies had been slow to make appropriations for the support 
01 the war. Pennsylvania and South Carolina, actuated bj different motives, 
had held back, but now the former made an appropriation of thirty thousand 
pounds, to be issued in paper, and the latter granted four thousand pounds 
toward enlisting two companies for the public service. 

The most important achievement of the provincials during that year, wa3 
the chastisement of the Indians at Kittaning, their chief town, situated on the 
Alleghany River. During several months they had spread terror and desola- 
tion along the western frontiers of Pennsylvania and Virginia, and almost a 
thousand white people had been murdered or carried into captivity. These acts 
aroused the people of Pennsylvania, and Dr. Franklin undertook the military 
command of the frontier, with the rank of colonel. Plis troops were voluntary 
militia. Under his directions, a chain of forts and blockhouses was erected 
along the base of the Kittaning mountains, from the Delaware to the Maryland 
line. Franklin soon perceived that he was not in his right place, and he 
abandoned military life forever. The Indians continuing their depredations, 
Colonel John Armstrong of Pennsylvania,' accompanied by Captain Mercer* of 
Virginia, with about three hundred men, attacked them on the night of the 7th 
of September [1756], killed their principal chiefs, destroyed their town, and 
completely humbled them. Thus ended the campaign of 1756. The French 
still held in possession almost all of the territory in dispute, and of the most 
important of their military posts. They had also expelled the English from 
Oswego and Lake George, and had compelled the powerful Six Nations to 
make a treaty of neutrality. On the whole, the campaign of 1756 closed with 
advantages on the part of the French. 

CAMPAIGN OP 1757. 

A military council was held at Boston on the 19th of January, 1757, when 
Lord Loudon proposed to confine the operations of that year to an expedition 
against Louisburg,^ and to the defense of the frontiers. Because he was com- 
mander-in-chief, wiser and better men acquiesced in his plans, but deplored his 
want of judgment and executive force. The people of New England, in par- 
ticular, were greatly disappointed when they ascertained that the execution of 
their favorite scheme of driving the French from Lake Champlain was to be 
deferred. However, the general ardor of the colonists was not abated, and the 
call for troops was so promptly responded to, that Loudon found himself at the 
head of six thousand provmcials on the first of June. The capture of Louis- 
burg was Loudon's first care. He sailed from New York on the 20th of that 
month, and on arriving at Halifax ten days afterward [June 30], he was joined 



7. " Page 30. 

i a general in the war for Independence, twenty years later. See note 1, page 249 

69. ' Pago 13'L 



194 



THE COLONIES. 



[1756. 



by Admiral Holborne, "with a powerful naval armament and five thousand land 
troops, from England. Thej were about to proceed to Cape Breton/ wn^n 
they were informed that six thousand troops were in the fortress at Louisburg," 
and that a French fleet, larger than Holborne's, was lying in that harbor. 
The latter had arrived and taken position while Loudon was moving slowly, 
with his characteristic indecision. The enterprise was abandoned, and Loudon 
returned to New York [Aug. 31], to hear of defeat and disgrace on the north- 
ern frontier, the result of his ignorance and utter unskillfulness. 

Montcalm had again borne away important trophies of victory. Toward 
the close of July, he left Ticonderoga with about eiglit thousand men (of whom 
two thousand were Indians), and proceeded to besiege Fort William Henry, at 
the head of Lake George.^ The garrison of three thousand men was commanded 
by Colonel Monro, a brave English officer, who felt strengthened in his position 
by the close proximity of his chief. General Webb, who was at the head of four 
thousand troops at Fort Edward,* only fifteen miles distant. But his confidence 
in his commanding general was sadly misplaced. When Montcalm demanded a 
surrender of the fort and garrison [August 4, 1757], Monro boldly refused, and 
sent an express to General Webb, for aid. It was not furnished. For six days 
Montcalm continued the siege, and expresses were sent daily to Webb for rein- 
forcements, but in vain. Even when General Johnson,^ with a corps of 
provincials and Putnam's Rangers,* had, on reluctant permission, marched 
several miles in the direction of the beleaguered fort, Webb 
recalled them, and sent a letter to Monro, advising him to 
surrender. That letter was intercepted by Montcalm,'' and 
with a peremptory demand for capitulation, he sent it to 
Monro. Perceiving further resistance to be useless, Monro 
yielded. Montcalm was so pleased with the bravery dis- 
played by the garrison, that he agreed upon very honorable 
terms of surrender, and promised the troops a safe escort to 
Fort Edward. His Indians, expecting olood and booty, 
were enraged by the merciful terms, and at the moment 
when the English entered the forests a mile from Fort Wil- 
liam Henry, the savages fell upon them with great fury, 
slaughtered a large number, plundered their baggage, and 
pursued them to within cannon shot of Fort Edward. 
Montcalm declared his inability to restrain the Indians, and 
expressed his deep sorrow. The fort and all its appendages were burned 
or otherwise destroyed.* It was never rebuilt ; and until 1854, nothing marked 

' Note 5, page 137. ' Pago 137. ' Page 191. " Page 190. ^ Page 190. 

* Israel Putnam, afterward a major-general in the army of the Revolution. He now held the 
commission of major, and with Major Rogers and his rangers, performed important services durmg 
the wliole French and Indian War. 

' It is said that Montcalm was just on the point of raising the siege and returning to Ticon- 
derogct, when Webb's cowardly letter fell into his hands. Tlie number and strength of Jolmson's 
troop^ -lad been greatly exaggerated, and Montcalm was preparing to flee. 

" Major Putnam visited the ruins wliile the fires were yet burning, and he described the scene 
ds very appalling. The bodies of murdered Englishmen were scattered in every direction, some of 



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LAKE GEORGE AND 
VICINITY. 



1763.] FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 195 

its site but an irregular line of low mounds on the border of the lake, a short 
distance from the village of Caldwell. Since then a hotel has been erected 
upon the spot, for the accommodation of summer tourists. Thus ended the 
military operations of the inefficient Earl of Loudon, for the year 1757. 

The position of aifairs in America now alarmed the English people. The 
result of the war, thus flir, was humiliating to British pride, while it incited 
the French to greater efforts in the maintenance of their power in the West. 
In the Anglo-American' colonies there was much irritation. Thoroughly 
imbued with democratic ideas, and knowing their competency, unaided by royal 
troops, to assert and maintain their rights, they regarded the interferences of 
the home government as clogs upon their operations. Some of the royal gov- 
ernors were incompetent and rapacious, and all were marked by a haughty 
deportment, offensive to the sturdy democracy of the colonists. Their demands 
for men and money, did not always meet with cheerful and ample responses ; 
and the arrogant assumption of the English officers, disgusted the commanders 
of the provincial troops, and often cooled the zeal of whole battalions of brave 
Americans. Untrammeled by the orders, exactions, and control of imperial 
power, the Americans would probably have settled the whole matter in a single 
campaign; but at the close of the second year of the war [1756] the result 
appeared more uncertain and remote than ever. The people of England had 
perceived this clearly, and clamored fior the dismissal of the Aveak and corrapt 
ministry then in power. The popular will prevailed, and William Pitt, by far 
the ablest statesman England had yet produced, was called to the control of 
public affairs in June, 1757. Energy and good judgment marked every move«' 
ment of his administration, especially in measures for prosecuting the war in 
America. Lord Loudon was recalled,^ and General Abercrombie^ was appointed 
to succeed him. A strong naval armament was prepared and placed under the 
command of Admiral Boscawen ; and twelve thousand additional English troops 
were allotted to the service in America.* Pitt addressed a letter to the several 
colonies, asking them to raise and clothe twenty thousand men. He promised, 
in the name of Parliament, to furnish arms, tents, and provisions for them ; 
and also to reimburse the several colonies all the money they should expend in 
raising and clothing the levies. These liberal offers had a magical effect, and 
an excess of levies soon appeared. New England alone raised fifteen thousand 
men;^ New York furnished almost twenty-seven hundred, New Jersey one 

them half consumed among the embers of the conflagration. Among the dead were more than one 
hundred women, many of whom had been scalped [note 4, page 14] by the Indians. 

* This is the title given to Americans who are of English descent. Those who are descendants 
of the Saxons who settled in England, are called Anglo-Saxons. 

^ Pitt gave as a chief reason for recalling London, that he could never hear from him, and did 
not know what he was about. Loudon was always arranging great plans, but executed nothing. 
It was remarked to Dr. Franklin, when he made inquiries concerning him, tl:at he was "hke St. 
George on the signs — always on horseback, but never rides forward." ^ Page 191. 

* Pitt had arranged such an admirable militia system for home defense, that a large number of 
the troops of the standing army could be spared for foreign service. 

* Public and private advances during 1758, in Massachusetts alone, amounted to more than a 
million of dollars. The taxes on real estate, in order to raise money, were enormous; in many 
instances equal to two thirds of the income of the tax-payers. Yet it was levied hy their own repre- 
eentaiives, and they did not murmur. A few years later, an almost nominal tax in the form of duty 



196 



THE COLONIES. 



[1766. 



thousand, Pennsylvania almost three thousand, and Virginia over two thousand. 
Some came from other colonies. Royal American troops (as they were called) 
organized in the Carolinas, were ordered to the North ; and when Abercrombie 
took command of the army in the month of May, 1758, he found fifty thousand 
men at his disposal ; a number greater than the whole male population of the 
French dominions in America, at that time.* 




LORD AJIIIEKST. 



CAMPAIGN OP 1758. 
The plan of the campaign of 1758, was comprehensive. Louisburg," Ticon- 
deroga, and Fort du Quesne,' were the principal points of operations pecified in 
it. This was a renewal of Shirley's scheme, and ample 
preparations were made to carry it out. The first blow 
was directed against Louisburg. Admiral Boscawen 
arrived at Halifax early in May, with about forty armed 
vessels bearing a land force of over twelve thousand men, 
under General Amherst* as chief, and General Wolfe'^ as 
his lieutenant. They left Halifax on the 28th of May, 
and on the 8th of June, the troops landed, without much 
opposition, on the shore of Gabarus Bay, near the city 
of Louisburg.® The French, alarmed by this demonstra- 
tion of power, almost immediately deserted their outposts, 
and retired within the town and fortress. After a vigorous resistance of almost 
fifty days, and when all theiifc shipping in the harbor was destroyed, the French 
surrendered the town and fort, together Avith the island of Cape Breton and 
that of St. John (now Prince Edward), and their dependencies, by capitulation, 
on the 26th of July, 1758. The spoils of victory were more than five thousand 
prisoners, and a large quantity of munitions of Avar. By this victory, the 
English became masters of the coast almost to the mouth of the St. Lawrence. 
When Louisburg fell, the power of France in America began to wane, and from 
that time its decline Avas continual and rapid. 

Activity noAV prevailed everyAvhere. While Amherst 
and Wolfe Avere conquering in the East, Abercrombie and 
young HoAve were leading seven thousand regulars, nine 
thousand provincials, and a heavy train of artillery, 
against Ticonderoga, then occupied by Montcalm wdth 
almost four thousand men. Abercrombie's army had ren- 
dezvoused at the head of Lake George, and at the close 
of a calm Sabbath evening [July, 1758] they went down 
that beautiful sheet of water in flat-boats, and at dawn 



"/ V C "^ 1 A 



TICONDEROGA- 



tipon an article of luxury, levied witlwut their consent, excited the people of that colony to rebellion. 
See page 109. 

* The total number of inhabitants in Canada, then capable of bearing arms, did not exceed 
twentr thousand. Of them, between four and five thousand were regular troops. 

* Page 229. ' Page 186. 

* Lord Jeffrey Amherst was born in Kent, England, in 1717. He was commander-in-chief of 
tTne army in England, during a part of our war for independence, and aflerward. He died in 1797, 
aged eigbty vears. ^ Note 8, page 200. " Note 5, page 137. 



1763.] 



THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 



197 




LORD HOWE. 



[Julj 6] landed at its northern extremity. The whole 
country from there to Tieonderoga was then covered 
with '^ dense forest, and tangled morasses lay in the 
pathway of the English army. Led by incompetent 
guides, they were soon bewildered, and while in this 
conditioL they were suddenly attacked by a French 
scouting party. The enemy was repulsed, but the vic- 
tory was a'^^ the expense of the life of Lord Howe.' He 
fell at the head of the advanced guard, and a greater 
part of the troops, who considered him the soul of the 
expedition, retreated in confusion to the landing-place. 

In the midst of the temporary confusion incident to the death of Howe, 
intelligence reached Abercrombie that a reinforcement for Montcalm was 

approaching. Deceived concern- 
ing the strength of the French 
lines across the neck of the pen- 
insula on which the fortress stood," 
he pressed forward to the attack 
without his artillery, and ordered 
his troops to scale the breast- 
works [July '8], in the foce of 
the enemy's fire. These* proved 
much stronger than he antici- 
pated,^ and after a bloody con- 
flict of four hours, Abercrombie 
fell back to Lake George, leav- 
ing almost two thousand of his men dead or wounded, in the deep forest.^ He 
hastened to his former camp at the head of the lake, and then, on the urgent 
solicita'don of Colonel Bradstreet, he detached three thousand men under that 
officer, to attack the French post at Frontenac^ They went by Avay of Oswego 




EUINS OF TICONDEROGA. 



' Lord Howe was brother of Admirnl Lord Howe, who commanded the British fleet on the 
AmerifjHH coast, in 1776-77, and of Sir WiUiam Howe, the commander of the land forces. He was 
greatly beloved by the troops; and Mante, who was in the service, remarks: "With him the soul 
of the expedition seemed to expire." He was only thirty-four years of age when he fell. The 
legislature of Massachusetts Bay appropriated one thousand two hundred and fifty dollars for a 
monument to his memory, in Westminster Abbey. His remains were conveyed to Albany by 
Captain (afterward General) Philip Schuyler, and there placed in a vault belonp,ing to the family 
of that officer. They were afterward removed to a place under the chancel of St. Tctcr's Church, 
on State-street, Albany, where they remain. At the time of their removal, it was ibund that Lord 
Howe's hair, whicli was very short when he was killed, had grown several inches, and exhibited 
beautiful smooth and glossy locks. 

* The diagram (p. 196) shows the general form of the principal works. The ground on which 
Tieonderoga stood is about one hundred feet above the level of the lake. Water is upon three sides, 
and a deep morass extends almost across the fourth, forming a narrrow neck, where the French liad 
erected a strong line of breastworks with batteries. This Hne was about a mile north-west of the 
fortress, which occupied the point of the peninsula. The ruins of the fort, deluieated in the above 
sketch, are yet [IS67] quite picturesque. 

* The breastworks were nine feet in height, covered in front by sharpened branches of feUed 
trees, pointing outward like a mass of bayonets. 

* Among the wounded was Captain Cliarles Lee, afterward a general in the army of the Revo* 
lutioa See note 4, page 243. ' Pago 180. 



J9S THE COLONIES. [1756. 

and Lake Ontario, and two days after landing [August 27, 1758], tliej cap- 
tured the fort, garrison, and shipping, without much resistance.' Bradstrect 
lost only three or four men in the conflict, but a fearful sickness broke out in 
his camp, and destroyed about five hundred of them. With the remainder, he 
felowly retraced his steps, and at the carrying-place on the IMohawk, where the 
village of Rome now sto.nds, his troops assisted in building Fort Stanwix.^ Aber- 
crombie, in the mean while, after garrisoning Fort George, ^ returned with the 
remainder of his troops to Albany. 

The expedition against Fort du Quesne,* in the West, was commanded by 
General Joseph Forbes, who, in July, had about six thousand men at his dis- 
posal, at Fort Cumberland and Raystown, including the Virginia troops under 
Colonel Washington, the Carolina Royal Americans, and an auxiliary force of 
Cherokee Indians. Protracted sickness, and perversity of will and judgment 
on the part of Forbes, caused delays almost fatal to the expedition. Contrary 
to the advice of Washington, he insisted, under the advice of some Pennsylvania 
land speculators, in constructing a new road, further north, over the mountains, 
instead of following the one made by Braddock. His progress was so slow, that 
in September, when it was known that not more than eight hundred men were 
at Fort du Quesne,^ Forbes, with six thousand troops, was yet east of the Al- 
leghanies. Major Grant, at the head of a scouting party ot Colonel Bouquet's 
advanced corps, was attacked [Sept 21], defeated, and made prisoner. Still 
Forbes moved slowly and methodically, and it was Kovember [Nov. 8], before 
he joined Bouquet with the main body, fifty miles from the point of destina- 
tion. The approach of winter, and discontent of the troops, caused a counsel 
of war to decide upon abandoning the enterprise, when three prisoners gave 
information of the extreme weakness of the French garrison. Washington 
was immediately sent forward, and the whole army prepared to follow. In- 
dian scouts discovered the Virginians when they were within a day's march 
of the fort, and their fear greatly magnified the number of the provincials. 
The French garrison, reduced to five hundred men, set fire to-the fort [Nov. 
24], and fled down the Ohio in boats, in great confusion, leaving every thing 
behind them. The Virginians took possession the following day. Forbes 
left a detachment of four hundred and fifty men, to repair and garrison the 
fort, and then hastened back to go into winter quarters. The name of Fort 
du Quesne was changed to Fort Pitt, in honor of the great English statesman.® 

' They made eight hundred prisoners!, and seized nine armed vessels, sixty cannons, sixteen 
mortars, a large quantity of ammunition and stores, and goods designed for traffic vv'ith tlie Indians. 
Among Bradstreet's subalterns, was Nathaniel Woodlmll, afterward a general at the commencement 
of the war for Independence. [See note 3, page 252.] Stark, Ward, Pomeroy,Gridley, Putnam, 
Schuyler, and many others who were distinguished in the Revolutionary struggle, were active par- 
ticipants in the scenes of the French and Indian War. 

=" Page 278. 

' Fort George was erected about a mile soutli-cast of the ruins of Fort William Henry, at the 
bead of Lake George. The ruins of the main work, or citadel, are still [18G1J quite prominent. 

* Page 186. 

' The capture of Fort Frontenac spread alarm among the French west of that important post, 
because their supplies from Canada wero cut olT. It so affected the Indians with fear, that a greater 
part of those who were allied to the French, deserted them, and Fort du Quesne was feebly gar- 
risoned. * Page 195. 



1763.] THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 199 

With this event, closed the campaign of 1758, which resulted in great gain 
to the English. They had effectually humbled the French, by capturing three 
of their most important posts,' and by weakening the attachment of their 
Indian allies. Miiny of the Indians had not only deserted the French, but at 
a great council held at Easton, on the Delaware, during the summer of that year 
they had, with the Six Nations,'^ made treaties of friendship or neutrality 
with the English.^ The right arm of French success was thus paralyzed, and 
peace was restored to the frontiers of Pennsylvania and Virginia. 

CAMPAIGN OF 1759. 

Four years had elapsed since the commencement of this inter-colonial war. 
The final struggle was now at hand. Encouraged by the success of the cam- 
paigns just closed, Pitt conceived the magnificent scheme of conquering all 
Canada, and destroying, at one blow, the French dominion in America. That 
dominion was now confined to the region of the St. Lawrence, for more distant 
settlements in the west and south, were like weak colonies cut off from the 
parent country. Pitt had the rare fortune to possess the entire confidence and 
esteem of the Parliament and the colonists. The former w^as dazzled by his 
greatness ; the latter Avere deeply impressed with his justice. He had promptly 
reimbursed all the expenses incurred by the piovincial Assemblies during the 
campaign,^ amounting to almost a million of dollars, and they as promptly sec- 
onded his scheme of conquest, which had been communicated to them under an 
oath of secresy. The unsuccessful Abercrombie^ was succeeded by the success- 
ful Amherst,* and early in the spring of 1759, the new commander-in-chief 
found twenty thousand provincial troops at his disposal. A competent land and 
naval force was also sent from England to co-operate with the Americans, and 
the campaign opened with brilliant prospects for the colonies. The general 
plan of operations against Canada was similar to that of Phipps and Winthrop 
in 1690.^ A strong land and naval force, under General Wolfe, was to ascend 
the St. Lawrence, and attack Quebec. Another force, under Amherst, was to 
drive the French from Lake Champlain, seize Montreal, and join Wolfe at 
Quebec ; and a third expedition, commanded by General Prideaux, was to cap- 
ture Fort Niagara, and then hasten down Lake Ontario to Montreal. 

On the 22d of July, 1759, General Amherst appeared before Ticonderoga 
with eleven thousand men. The French commander had just heard of the 
arrival of Wolfe at Quebec [June 27], and offered no resistance. The garrison 
left the lines on the 23d of July, and retired witliin the fort, and three days 
afterward [July 26j they abandoned that also, partially demolished it, and fled 
to Crown Point. Amherst pursued them, and on his approach, they took to 
their boats [Aug. 1], and went down the lake to Isle Aux Noix,^ in the Sorel 

* Louisburg, Frontenac, and Du Quesne. Others, except Quebec, were stockades. Note 2, 
page 183. ^ Page 25. 

3 The chief tribes represented, were tlie Delawares. Sliawnees, Nanticokes, Mohegans, Conoys, 
and Monseys. The Twightwces. on the Ohio [page 19], had always remained the friends of the 
EngHsh. * Page 195. * Page 191. 

* Page 196. ' Page 131. • Pronounced Noo-dh. 



200 



THE COLONIES. 



[1756 




River. Amheist remained at Crown Poin^ long enough to construct a sufficient 
number of rude boats to convey his troops, artillery, and bag- 
gage, and then started to drive his enemy before him, across the 
St. Lawrence. It Avas now mid-autumn [Oct. 11], and heavy 
storms compelled him to return to Crown Point, and place his 
troops in Avinter quarters.' While there, they constructed that 
J strong fortress, whose picturesque ruins, after the lapse of almost 
ciiuu.N iuiM/ ^ imndred years, yet [18G7] attest its strength. 
Accompanied by Sir William Johnson, as his lieuten- 
ant, Prideaux collected his forces (chiefly provincial-,)' 
at Oswego, and sailed from thence to Niagara. He 
landed without opposition, on the 17th of July, and im- 
mediately commenced the siege. On the same day he 
was killed, by the bursting of a gun, and was succeeded 
in command ] v General Johnson. The beleaguered gar- 
rison, in daily expectation of reinforcements which had 
been ordered from the southern and Avestern forts, held 
out braA^ely for three Aveeks, Avhen, on the 24th of July, 
the expected troops appeared. They were almost three 
half being French regulars, and the remainder Indians, many of them from the 
Creek* and Cherokee' nations. A scA^ere conflict ensued. The relief forces 
were completely routed, and on the folloAving day [July 25], Fort Niagara and 
its dependencies, and the garrison of scA^en hundred men, were surrendered to 
Johnson. The connecting link of French military posts betAveen Canada and 
Louisiana'"' Avas eifectually broken, never again to be united. Encumbered with 
his nrisoners, arid unable to procure a sufficient number of vessels for the pur- 
pose, Johnson could not proceed to Montreal, to co-operate with Amherst and 
Wolfe on the St. LaAvrence, according to the original plan.'' He garrisoned 
Fort Niagara, and returned home. 

Animated Avith high hopes, Wolfe' left Louisburg, with eight thousand 
troops, under a convoy of tAventy-two line-of-battle ships, and as many frigates 




FORT NIAGARA. 



thousand strons;, 



* 'WIulo at Crown Point, Major Rogers, at tlio head of his celebrated Rangers, went on an ex- 
pedition against tlie St. Francis Indians^ who had long been a terror to the frontier settlements of 
New England. The village was destroyed, a large number of Indians were slain, and the Rangers 
were completely victorious. They suffered from cold and hunger while on their return, and many 
were left dead in the forest before tlie party reached the nearest settlement at Bellows Falls. 
Rogers went to England after the war, returned in 1775, joined the British army at New York, 
and soon went to Ihigland again, where he died. 

* The above diagram shows the general form of the military works at Crown Point. These, 
like the ruins at Ticonderoga, are quite picturesque remains of the past. AAA shove's the position 
of the strong stone barracks, portions of which are yet standing. W shows tlie place of a very deep 
well, dug through the so\id rock. It was filled up, and so remained until a few years ago, when 
some money-diggers, foolishly believing there was treasure at the bottom, cleaned it out. They 
found nothino: but a few scraps of iron and other rubbish. ^ 

' Johnson's influence over the Six Nations, made many of them disregard the treatyof neutral- 
ity made with Montcalm [note 4, page 1921. and a considerable number accompanied him to 
Niagara * Page 30. ^ Page 27. ^ Page 180. ' Page 199. 

^ James Wolfa was the son of a British general, and was born in Kent, England, in 172G. Be- 
fore he was twenty years of age, he was distinguished in battle. Ho was now only thirty-three 
years old. • 



1763.] 



THE FRENCH AND INDIAN "WAR. 



201 




GEXERAi, WOLFE. 



and smaller armed vessels, commanded by Admirals Holmes and Saunders, and, 
on the 27th of June, landed upon Orleans Island, a few miles below Quebec. 
That city then, as now, consisted of an Upper and Lower Town, the former 
within fortified walls, upon the top and declivities of a 
latter lying upon a narrow beach at the edge of the 
water. Upon the heights, three hundred feet above the 
water, was a level plateau called the Plains of Abra- 
ham. At the mouth of the St. Charles, which here 
enters the St. Lawrence, the French had moored several 
floating batteries.^ The town was strongly garrisoned , 
by French regulars, and along the north bank of the 
St. Lawrence, from the St. Charles to the Montmorenci 
River, was the main French army, under Montcalm,^ in 
a fortified camp. It was composed chiefly of Canadian 
militia and Indians. ;(' 

On the 80th of July, the English, after a slight skirmish, took possession 
of Point Levi, opposite Quebec, and throwing hot shot from a battery, they 
almost destroyed the Lower Town. They could not damage the strong fortifi- 
cations of the city from that distance, 
and Wolfe resolved to attack the 
French camp. He had already land- 
ed a large force, under Generals 
Townshend and ]\Iurray, and formed 
a camp [July 10, 1750], below the 
River Montmorenci. General Monck- 
ton, with grenadiers^ and other troops., 
crossed from Point Levi, and landed 
upon the beach [July 81], at the base 
of the high river bank, just above that stream, Murray and Townshend were 
ordered to force a passage across the Montmorenci, and co-operate with him, 
but Monckton was too eager for attack to await their coming. lie unwisely 
rushed forward, but was soon repulsed, and compelled to take shelter behind a 
block-house^ near the beach, just as a heavy thunder-storm, which had been 
gathering for several hours, burst upon the combatants. Night came on before 
it ceased, and the roar of the rising tide warned the English to take to their 
boats. Five hundred of their number had perished. 

Two months elapsed, and yet the English had gained no important advan- 
tages. "Wolfe had received no intelligence from Amherst, and the future ap- 




IIIUTARY OPERATIOXS AT QUEBEC. 



' These were a kind of flat-boats, with proper breastworks or other defenses, and armed with 
cannons. 

^ He was descended from a noble fimilv. He was appointed governor of Canada in 1T5G. Hia 
remains are beneath the Ursuline convent at Quebec. 

' Grenadiers are companies of tlie regular army, distinguished from the rest by some peculiarity 
of dress and accoutrements, and always composed of the tallest and most muscular men iu the serv- 
ice. They are generally employed in bayonet charges, and sometimes carry grenades, a kind of 
small bomb-shell. * Note 3, page 192. 



202 THE COLONIES. [176& 

peared gloomy. The exposure, fatigue, and anxietj which he had endured 
produced a violent fever, and at the beginning of September [1759J, he lay 
prostrate in his tent. He called a council of war at his bedside, and, on the 
suggestion of ToAvnshend, it Avas resolved to scale the heights of Abraham,' and 
assail the town on its weakest side. Wolfe heartily approved of the design. 
A plan Avas speedily matured, and feeble as he was, the commander-in-chief 
determined to lead the assault in person. The camp at the Mon:morenci was 
broken up [Sept. 8], and the attention of Montcalm was diverted from the real 
designs of the English, by seeming preparations to again attack his lines. The 
affair was managed so secretly and skillfully, that even De Bourgainville, who 
had been sent up the St. Lawrence by Montcalm, with fifteen hundred men, 
to watch the movements of the English, had no suspicion of their designs. 

All preparations having been completed, the English ascended the river, in 
several vessels of the fleet, on the evening of the 12th of September. They 
went several miles above the intended landing-place. Leaving the ships at 
midnight, they embarked in flat boats, with mufiled oars, and moved silently 
down to the mouth of a ravine, a mile and a half from the city, and landed.^ 
At dawn [Sept. 13], Lieutenant- Colonel Howe^ led the van up the tangled 
ravine, in the face of a sharp fire from a guard above. He was followed by the 
generals and the remainder of the troops, with artillery; and at sunrise the 
whole army stood in battle array upon the Plains of Abraham. It was an 
apparition little anticipated by the vigilant Montcalm. He 
perceived the peril of the city ; and marching his whole army 
immediately from his encampment, crossed the St. Charles, and 
between nine and ten o'clock in the morning, confronted the 
Eno-lish. A general, fierce, and bloody battle now ensued. Al- 
though twice severely wounded, Wolfe kept his feet; and as 
the two armies closed upon each other, he placed himself at the 
head of his grenadiers, and led them to a charge. At that mo- 
ment a bullet entered his breast. He was carried to the rear, 
and a fcAV moments afterward, Monckton, who took the com- 
„o^„,,,„^ .,.,„, ,„ji.Emand, also fell, severely wounded. Townshend continued the 
Anu MONTvjALM. j-j^^jg Moutcalm soon received a flital wound ;* and the French, 
terribly pierced by English bayonets, 'and smitten by Highland broadswords, 
broke and lied. Wolfe died just as the battle ended, with a smile upon liis lips, 
because his ears hoard the victory-shouts of his army. Five hundred French- 




> Tlie declivity from Cape Diamond, on which tho chief fortress stands, along the St. Lawrence 
to the cove below Sillcry, was called by the general name of the Heights of Abraham, the ptains of 
that name being on tlie top. See map on page 201. 

' Tliis place is known as Wolfts Cove; and tlie ravine, which here breaks the steepness of the 
rocky sliore, and np which the Kimlish clambered, is called Wnlfe's Bovine. 

^ Afterward General Sir William Howe, the commander-in-chief of the English forces in Amer- 
ica, whi-n the Revolution had fairly Commenced. Page 247. 

4 He was carried into the citv, and when tnld that he must die, he said, "So much the better; 
I shall then bo .spared the mortification of seeing the surrender of Quebec." His remains are yet 
in Quebec; those of Wolfe were conveved to England. Peoiile of tlie two nations have long dwelt 
peaceably together in tliat ancient city, and they have united m orect.ng a tall granite obelisk, 
dedicated to the linked memory of Wolfe and Montcahn. 



lit 




\v 




TSIE^IPIEI (S)W "WOILIFJE: 



1763.] THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 208 

men were killed, and (including the wounded) a thousand were taken prisonera. 
The English lost six hundred, in killed and wounded. 

General Townshend now prepared to besiege the citj. Threatened famine 
within aided him; and five days after the death of Wolfe [Sept. 18, 1759], 
Quebec, with its fortifications, shipping, stores, and people, was surrendered to 
the English, and five thousand troops, under General Murray, immediately took 
possession. The fleet, with the sick and the French prisoners, sailed for 
Halifax. The campaign now ended, yet Canada was not conquered. The 
French yet held Montreal, and had a considerable land and naval force above 
Quebec. 

CAMPAIGN OF 17G0. 

Notwithstanding these terrible disasters, the French were not dismayed, 
and early in the spring of 1760, Vaudreuil, then governor-general of Canada, 
sent M. Levi, the successor of Montcalm, to recover Quebec. lie Avcnt down 
the St. Lawrence, with six frigates and a strong land force. General Murray 
marched out, and met him at Sillery, about three miles above Quebec, and 
there, on the 4th of April, was fought one of the most sanguinary battles of the 
war. Murray was defeated. He lost all his artillery, and about a thousand 
men, but succeeded in retreating to the city with the remainder. Levi now 
laid siege to Quebec, and Murray's condition was becoming perilous, from the 
want of supplies, when an English squadron, with reinforcements and provisions, 
appeared [May 9] in the St. Lawrence. Levi supposed it to be the whole 
British fleet, and at once raised the siege [May 10], and flod to Montreal, after 
losing most of his shipping. 

Now came the final struggle. The last stronghold of the French was now 
to be assailed ; and Vandreuil gathered all his forces at ]\Iontreal for the 
conflict. Amherst had made extensive preparations during the summer ; and 
early in September [Sept. 6-7], three English armies met before the doomed 
city. Amherst, at the head of ten thousand troops, and a thousand warriors 
of the Six Nations, under General Johnson,* arrived on the 6th, and was 
joined, the same day, by General Murray, and four thousand troops, from 
Quebec. The next day. Colonel Haviland arrived, with threo thousand troops, 
from Crown Point,"^ having taken possession of Isle Aux-Noix^ on the way. 
Against such a crushing force, resistance would be vain ; and Vandreuil im- 
mediately signed a capitulation [Sept. 8, 1760], surrendering Montreal, and 
all other French posts in Canada, into the hands of the English.* The regular 
troops, made prisoners at Montreal, were to be sent to Franco ; and the Cana- 
dians were guarantied perfect security in person, property, and religion.^ 
General Gage" was appointed governor at Montreal ; and Murray, with four 
thousand men, garrisoned Quebec. 

' Page 190. ^ Page 198. ' Xot- 8, pngo 107. 

* The chief posts surrendered were Presque Isle (now Eric, Pennsylvania), Detroit, and Mac- 
kinaw. 

* They were chiefly Roman Catholics, and that is yet the prevailing religion in Lower Canada. 

* Pages 186 and 226. 



204 THE COLONIES. [1756. 

Tho conquest of Canada produced great joy in the Anglo-American 
colonies,' and in none was it more intense than in that of New York, 
because its Avhole northern frontier lay exposed to the enemy. The exultation 
was very great in New England, too, for its eastern frontiers were now relieved 
from the terrible scourge of Indian warfare, by which they had been desolated 
eix times within a little more than eighty years. In these wars, too, the 
Indians had become almost annihilated. The subjugation of the French seemed 
to be a guaranty of peace in the future, and the people everywhere assembled 
to utter public thanksgiving to HiM who rules the nations. 

Althoum-h the war had ceased in America, the French and English contin- 
ued it upon the ocean, and among the West India Islands, with almost con- 
tuaual success for the latter, until 1763, when a definitive treaty of peace," 
agreed upon tho year before, was signed at Paris [February 10, 1763], by 
which France ceded to Great Britain all her claimed possessions in America, 
eastward of the Mississippi, north of the latitude of Iberville River.' At the 
same time, Spain, with whom the English had been at war for a year previously, 
ceded [February 10. 1763] East and West Florida to the British crown. And 
now, England held undisputed possession (except by the Indians) of the whole 
Continent, from the shores of the Gulf of Mexico to the frozen North, and from 
ocean to ocean.* 

The storm of war still lowered in the southern horizon, when the French 
dominion ceased in Canada. While tho English were crushing the Gallic power 
in the north, the frontier settlements of the Carolinas were suffering dreadfully 
from frequent incursions of Indian war parties. French emissaries were busy 
among the Cherokees, hitherto the treaty friends of the English ; and their 
influence, and some wrongs inflicted upon the Indians by some frontier Virginia 
Rangers, produced hostilities, and a fierce war was kindled in March, 1760." 
The whole western frontier of the Carolinas was desolated in the course of a few 
weeks. Tho people called aloud for help, and Amherst heeded their supplica- 
tions. Early in April, Colonel INIontgomery, with some British regulars and 
provincial troops, marched from Charleston, South Carolina, and laid waste a 
portion of the Cherokee country.'^ Those bold aboriginal highlanders Avere not 
subdued; but when, the following year. Colonel Grant led a stronger force 
against thcm,^ burned their towns, desolated their fields, and killed many of 
their warriors, they humbly sued for peace [June, 1761], and ever afterward 
remained comparatively quiet. 

The storm in the South had scarcely ceased, when another, more porten- 
tous and alarming, gathered in the North-west. Pontiac, a sagacious chief of 

' Note 1. page 193. ^ Franco and England, Spain and Portugal, were parties to this treaty. 

' New Orleans, and the whole of Louisiana, was ceded by France to Spain at the same time, 
and she relinquislied her entire possessions in North America. In 1800, Spain, by a secret treaty,' 
retroceded Louisiana to France; and in 1803, Napoleon sold it to the United States for fifteen mil- 
lions of dollars. S^e page 390. 

* The cost, to England, of this Seven Tears' War, as the conflict was called in Europe, was five 
hundred and sixty millions of dollars. ' Page 27. " Page 27. 

' Marion, Moultrie, and several other men, afterward distinguished in the war for Independ- 
ence, accompanied Grant on tliis occasion. 



1763.] THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR. 



205 



the Ottawas/ who had been an earlj allj of the French, secretly confetlerated 
several of the ALGOiNQuiN tribes, in 17G3, for the purpose of expelling the 
English from the country west of the Alleghanies.^ After the fall of Montreal 
Pontiac had professed an attachment to the English ; and as there seemed safety 
for settlers west of the mountains, immigration began to pour its livino- stream 
oyer those barriers. Like Philip of Mount Ilope,^ Pontiac saw, in the future, 
visions of the displacement, perhaps destruction, of his race, by the pale-faces ; 
and he determined to strike a blow for life and country. So adroitly were his 
plans matured, that the commanders of the western forts had no suspicions of 
his conspiracy until it was ripe, and the first blow had been struck, in the 
month of June. Within a fortnight, all the posts in possession of the English, 
west of Oswego, fell into his hands, except Niagara,' Fort Pitt,*^ and Detroit. 
Colonel Bouquet saved Pittsburg;' Niagara was not attacked; and Detroit, 
after sustaining a siege of almost twelve months, -was relieved by Colonel Brad- 
street,8 who arrived there with reinforcements, in May, 1764. The Indians 
were now speedily subdued, their power was broken, and the hostile tribes sent 
their chiefs to ask for pardon and peace. The haughty Pontiac refused 
to bow to the white people, and took refuge in the country of the Illinois, 
where he was treacherously murdered' in 1769. This was the last act in the 
dramaof the French and Indian War." 

In our consideration of the history of the United States, we have now 
arrived at a point of great interest and importance. We have traced the growth 
of the colonies through infancy and youth, as their interests and destinies gradu- 
ally commingled, until they really formed one people," strong and lusty, hke 



' Page 18. 

^ The confederation consisted of the Ottawas, Miamies, "f^yandots, Chippewas, Pottawatomies, 
Mississaguies, Shawnoese, Outagamies or Foxes, and Winnebagoes. The Senecas, the most westerly 
clan of the Six Nations, also joined in the conspiracy. = Page 203. 

* Page 124. ^ Page 200. « Page 198*. 

' Henry Bouquet was a brave English ofBcer. He was appointed lloutenant-colonel in 1756, 
and was in the expedition against Fort du Quesne (page 198). In 1763, Amherst sent him from 
Montreal, with provisions and military stores for Fort Pitt. His arrival was timely, and he saved 
the garrison from destruction. The following year he commanded an expedition against the Indians 
in Ohio, and was successful. His journal was published after the war. ^ Page 198. 

" An English trader bribed a Peoria Indian to murder him, for which he gave him a barrel of 
rum. The place of his death was Cahokia, a small village on the east side of the Mississippi, a httle 
below St. Louis. Pontiac was one of the greatest of all the Indian chiefs known to the white peo- 
ple, and deserved a better fate. It is said, that during the war of 1763, he appointed a commissary, 
and issued Ijills of credit. So highly was he esteemed by the French Inhabitants, that these were 
received by them. Montcalm thought much of him ; and at the time of his death, Pontiac was 
dressed in a French uniform, presented to him by that commander. See page 202. Pontiac was 
buried where the city of St. Louis now stands, and that busy mart is his monument, though not his 
memorial. 

'° The work most accessible to the general reader, in which the details of colonial events may 
be found, is Graham's Colonial History of the ' United States, in two volumes octavo, published by 
Blanchard and Lea, Philadelphia. 

" It must not be understood, that there was yet a perfect unity of feeling among the various 
colonists. Sectional interests produced sectional jealousies, and these worked much mischief, even 
while soldiers from almost every colony were fighting shoulder to shoulder [page 190] in the conti- 
nental army. Burnaby, who traveled in America at this period, expressed tlie opinion, that 
sectional jealousy and dissimilarity would prevent a permanent union ; yet he avers that the peoplo 
were imbued with ideas of independence, and that it was frequently remarked among them, that 
" the tide of dominion was running westward, and that America was destined to be the mistress of 
the world." TJ;e colonists themselves were not uruuiudful of the importance of their position, and 



206 THE COLONIES. [1756. 

the mature man, prepared to vindicate natural rights, and to fashion political and 
social systems adapted to their position and wants. We view them now, con- 
scious of their physical and moral strength, possessing clear views of right and 
justice, and prepared to demand and defend both. This is the point in the 
progress of the new and growing nation to which our observation is now 
directed, when the great question was to be decided, whether independent self- 
control should be enjoyed, or continued vassalage to an ungenerous parent 
should be endured. Our next topic will be the events connected with the 
settlement of that question. It is a topic of highest significance. It looms up 
in the panorama of national histories like some giant Alp, far above its fellows, 
isolated in grandeur, yet assimilated in sympathy with all others. 

they gave freely of their substance to carry on the contest for the mastery. Probably, the " Seven 
Years' War'' cost the colonies, in the aggregate, full twenty millions of dollars, besides the flower 
of their youth ; and, in return. Parliament granted them, during the contest, at different periods, 
about five millions and a half of dollars. Parliament subsequently voted one million of dollars to 
the coloniee, but, on account of the troubles arising from the Stamp Act and kindred measures, min- 
isters withheld the sum. 

The following is a list, taken from official records, of " The grants in Parliament for Rewards, 
Encouragement, and Indemnification to the Provinces m North America, for their Services and Ex- 
penses during the last [seven years'] "War : 

" On the 3d of February, 1756, as a free gift and reward to the colonies of New England, New 
York, and Jerse.y, for their past services, and as an encouragement to continue to exert themselves 
with vigor, $575,000. 

"May 19th, 1757. For the use and relief of the provinces of North and South Carolina, and 
Virginia, in recompense for services performed and to be performed, $250,000. 

"June 1st, 1758. To reimburse the province of Massachusetts Bay their expenses in furnishing 
provisions and stores to the troops raised by them in 1756, $136,900. To reimburse the province 
of Connecticut their expenses for ditto, $68,680. 

"April 30th, 1759. As a compensation to the respective colonies for the expenses of clothing, 
pay of troops, etc., $1,000,000. 

"March 31st, 1700. For the same, $1,000,000. For the colony of New York, to reimburse 
their expenses in furnishing provisions and stores to the troops in 1756, $14,885. 

"Jan. '20th, 1761. As a compensation to the respective colonies for clothmg, pay of the troops, 
etc., $1,000,000. 

"Jan. 26th, 1762. Ditto, $666,666. 

"March 15th, 1763. Ditto, $666,666. 

"April 22d, 1770. To reimburse the province of New Hampshire their expenses in furnishing 
provisions and stores to the troops in the campaign of 1756, $30,045. Total, $5,408,842." 

In a pamphlet, entitled Rights of Britain and Claims of America, an answer to the Declara- 
tion of the Continental Congress, setting forth the causes and the necessity of their taking up arms, 
printed in 1776, is a table showing the annual expenditures of the British government in support of 
the civil and military powers of the American colonies, from the accession of the family of Hanover, 
in 1714, until 1775. The expression of the writer is, "Employed in the defense of America." This 
isincon-ect; for the wars with the French on this continent, which cost the greatest amount of 
money, were wars for conquest and territory, though ostensibly for the defense of the Anglo-Amer- 
ican colonies against the encroachments of their Gallic neighbors. During the period alluded to 
(sixty years), the sums granted for the army amounted to $43,899,625; for the navy, $50,000,000; 
money laid out in Indian presents, in holding Congresses, and purchasing cessions of land, 
$30,500,000 ; making a total of $123,899,625. Within that period the following bounties on 
American commodities were paid: On indigo, $725,110; on hemp and flax, .<^27,800; on naval 
stores imported into Great Britain from America, $7,293,810; making the total sum paid on ac- 
count of bounties, $8,047,320. The total amount of money expended in sixty years on account of 
America^ $131,946,945. 




PATRICK HENRY BEFORE THE VIRGINIA ASSEMBLY. 




^'A 



PERIOD. 



THE REVOLUTION. PRELIMINARY EVENTS. 
rtGl—lllo. 



JAMES OTIS. 



CHAPTER I. 

Principles, like the ultimate particles of 
matter, and the laws of God, are eternal, inde- 
structible, and unchangeable. They have 
existed in the moral realm of our world since the advent of man ; and devious 
as may be their manifestations, according to circumstances, they remain the 
same, inherently, and always exhibit the same tendencies. When God gave to 
man an intelligent soul, and invested him with the prerogatives of moral free 
agency, then was born that instinctive love of liberty which, through all past 
time, has manifested itself in individuals and in societies; and in every age, the 
consciences of men have boldly and indignantly asked, in the presence of 
oppression, 

"If I'm design'd yon lordling's slave, 

By Nature's laws designed ; 
"Why was an independent wish 

E'er planted in my mind ? 
If not, why am I subject to 

His cruelty or scorn? 
Or why has man the wiU and pow'r 

To make his fellow mourn?" ' 

* Bums. 



208 THE REVOLUTION. [1761. 

Nations, like men, have thus spoken. The principles of civil and religious 
liberty, and the inalienable rights of man which thej involve, Avere recognized 
and asserted long before Columbus left Palos for the New World/ Their 
maintenance had shaken thrones and overturned dynasties before Charles the 
First was brought to the block f and thej had lighted the torch of revolution long 
before the trumpet-tones of James Otis^ and Patrick Henry* aroused the Anglo- 
Americans' to resist British aggression. From the earliest steps in the progress 
of the American colonies, we have seen the democratic theories of all past reform- 
ers developed into sturdy democratic practice ; and a love of liberty Avhich had 
germinated beneath the heat of persecution in the Old World, budded and 
blossomed all over the New, Avherever English hearts beat, or English tongues 
gave utterance. Nor did English hearts alone cherish the precious seedling, 
nor English tongues alone utter the noble doctrines of popular sovereignty ; but 
in the homes of all in this beautiful land, whatever country gave the inmates 
birth, there was a shrine of freedom, and a refuge for the oppressed. Here 
king-craft and priest-craft never had an abiding-place, and their ministers were 
always weak in the majestic presence of the popular will. 

Upon the bleak shores of Massachusetts Bay ; upon the banks of the Hud- 
son, the Delaware, the Potomac, and the James ; and amid the pine-forests or 
beneath the palmettos of the Carolinas, and the further South, the colonists, 
from the very beginning, had evinced an impatience of arbitrary rule ; and 
every manifestation of undue control by local magistrates or distant monarchs — 
every effort to abridge their liberties or absorb their gains, stimulated the 
growth of democratic principles. These permeated the whole social and politi- 
cal life in America, and finally evolved from the crude materials of royal 
charters, religious covenants, and popular axioms, that galaxy of representative 
governments which, having the justice of the English Constitution, the truth 
of Christian ethics, and the wisdom of past experience for their foundation, 
were united in "the fullness of time," in that symmetrical combination of free 
institutions known as the Republic of the United States of America. 

It is a common error to regard the Revolution which attended the birth of 
this Republic, as an isolated episode in the history of nations, having its causes 
in events immediately preceding the convulsion. It was not the violent result 
of recent discontents, but the culmination of a long series of causes tending to 
such a climax. The parliamentary enactments which kindled the rebellion in 
1775, were not oppressive measures entirely novel. They had their counter- 
parts in the British statute books, even as early as the restoration of monarchy 
[1660J° a hundred years before, when navigation laws,^ intended to crush the 
growing commerce of the colonies were enacted. They were only re-assertions 
of tyrannical legislative power and royal prerogatives, to which the colonies, in 
the weakness of their infancy and early youth, were compelled to submit. Now 
they had grown to maturity, and dared to insist upon receiving exact justice, 

' Page 39. "^ Note 3, page 108. ' Page 212. * Note 1, page 214. 

» Note 1, page 103. * Page 109. ' Note 4, page 109. 



1775.] PRELIMINARY EVENTS. 209 

They had recently emerged from an exhausting war, which, instead of weaken- 
ing them, had taught them their real moral, political, and physical strength. 
They had also learned the important lesson of power in union, and profited by 
its teachings. Having acquired a mastery over the savages of the wilderness, 
and assisted in breaking the French power on their frontiers, into atoms,' they 
felt their manhood stirring within them, and they tacitly agreed no longer to 
submit to the narrow and oppressive policy of Great Britain. Their industry 
and commerce were too expansive to be confined within the narrow limits of 
those restrictions which the Board of Trade," from time to time, had imposed, 
and they determined to regard them as mere ropes of sand. For long and 
gloomy years they had struggled up, unaided and alone, from feebleness to 
strength. They had built fortifications, raised armies, and fought battles, for 
England's glory and their own preservation, without England's aid, and often 
without her sympathy. ^ And it was not until the growing importance of the 
French settlements excited the jealousy of Great Britain, that her ministers 
perceived the expediency of justice and liberality toward her colonies, in order 
to secure their loyalty and efficient co-operation.* Compelled to be self-reliant 
from the beginning, the colonists were made strong by the mother's neglect ; 
and when to that neglect she added oppression and scorn, they felt justified in 
using their developed strength in defense of their rights. 

The colonists had grown strong, not only in material prosperity, percep- 
tions of inalienable rights, and a will to be free, but in many things in which 
the strength and beauty of a State consist, they exhibited all the most prom- 
inent developments of a great nation. A love for the fine arts had been grow- 
ing apace for many years ; and when the Revolution broke out, West^ and 
Copley,* natives of America, were wearing, in Europe, the laurel-crowns of 
supreme excellence as painters. Literature and science were beginning to be 
highly appreciated, and the six colonial colleges' were full of students. God- 
frey, the glazier, who invented the quadrant, had flourished and passed away ;* 

■ Page 203. " Note 5, page 134. 

' Georgia, alone, received parliamentary aid [page 100], in the establishment of settlements. In 
all the other colonies, where vast sums were expended in fitting out expeditions, purchasing the 
SOU of the Indians, and sustaining the settlers, neither the crown nor parliament ever contributed 
a farthing of pecuniary aid. The settling of Massachusetts alone, cost a million of dollars. Lord 
Baltimore spent two hundred thousand dollars in colonizing Maryland ; and William Penn became 
deeply involved in debt, in his efibrts to settle and improve Pennsylvania. * Page 197. 

* Benjamin West was born in Chester county, Pennsylvania, in 1738. His parents were 
Quakers. He commenced art-life as a portrait-painter, when wealthy men furnished hun with 
means to go to Italy. He soon triumphed, went to England, was patronized by the king, and 
became the most eminent historical painter of his age. He died in London in 1820, in the eighty- 
second year of his age. 

° John Singleton Copley was also bom in 1738. in the city of Boston. He became a pupil of 
Smibert [note 8, page 158], and became an eminent portrait-painter. His famOy relations identified 
him with the Royalists at the commencement of the Revolution, and he went to England to seek 
employment, where he was patronized by West. There he painted two memorable pictures; C-J 
for the House of Lords, the other for the Ho>:se of Commons. These established his fame, and led to 
fortune. His son became lord chancellor of England, and was made a peer, with the title of Lord 
Lyndhurst. Copley died in England, in 1815, at the age of seventy-seven years. 

' Page 178. 

* Thomas Godfrey was a native of Pennsylvania, and was bom in 1704. He was the real 
inventor of the quadrant known as Hadley's. See Lossing's Eminent Americans. 



210 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[116L 



Bartram, the farmer, had become "American Botanist to his Majesty;"' 
Franklin, the printer, was known, wherever civilization had planted her ban- 
ners, as the lightning-tamer and profound moral philosopher ; and Rittenhouse, 
the clock-maker, had calculated and observed the transit of Venus, and oon- 




i/]mf' ftw/ 






stmcted that Planetarium which is yet a wonder in the world of mechanism.' 
Theology and the legal profession, had taken high ground. Edwards^ had 
written his great work on The 'Freedom of the Will, and was among the 
dead ; and already Otis,* Henry,^ Dickenson," Rutledge,^ and other lawyers, 
had made their brilliant marks, and were prepared to engage in the great strug- 
gle at hand. All classes of men had noble representatives in the colonies, when 
the conflict commenced. 

There was no cause for complaint on the part of the colonists, of the willful 
exercise of tyrannical power, for purposes of oppression, by Great Britain. 

' See Lospin.a:'s Eminent Americans. 

* David Rittenhouse was born in Roxboroug:li, Pennsylvania, in 1732. As he exhibited great 
mechanical genius, his father apprenticed him to a clock-maker, and he became one of the most 
eminent mechanicians and mathematicians of his time. He discovered that remarkable feature in 
algebraic analysis, called fluxions, and applied it to the mechanic arts. He constructed a machine 
which represented the motions of the solar system. That Planetarium is now in the possession of 
the College of New Jersey, at Princeton Rittenhouse succeeded Franklin as president of the 
American Philosophical Society. He died in 1793, at the age of sixty-four years. 

' Jonathan P]dwards was one of the most eminent of American divines. He was born in East 
Windsor, Connecticut, in 1703, and died at Princeton, New Jersey, while president of the college^ 
in 1768. * Page 212. ' Page 214,. ^ Page 219. ' Page 310. 



1775.] 



PRELIMINARY EVENTS. 



211 



There was no motive for such a course. But they reasonably complained of 
an unjust and illiberal policy, which accomplished all the purposes of absolute 
tyranny. The rod of iron was often covered with velvet, and was wielded as 
often by ignorant, rather than by wicked, hands. Yet the ignorant hand, with 




-the concealed rod, smote as lustily and offensively, as if it had been a wicked 
one, and the rod bare. The first form of governmental and proprietary oppres- 
sion' was in the appointment of local rulers. The people were not represented. 
in the appointing power. Then came commercial restrictions,' prohibitions to 
manufacture, 3 imposts upon exchanges,'' and direct taxation, by enactments of 
parliament, in which the colonists were not represented. At the beginnmg, 
they had asserted, ai^d during their whole progress they had maintained, that 
important pohtical maxim, that taxation without representation, is tyranny. 
This was the fundamental doctrine of their political creed— this was the test of 
all parliamentary measures —this was the strong rock upon which the patriots 
of the Revolution anchored their faith and hope. 

When the French and Indian War was closed by the treaty of Paris, 

' Three forms of government had existed, namely, clmrter, proprietary, and royal. The New 
England governments were based upon royal charters ; New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and 
the Carolinas, were owned and governed by individuals or companies, and the remamder were 
immediately subject to the crown. Not^\ithstandiug this diversity in the source of government, the 
anti-monarchical spirit pervaded the people of all, from the beghmmg, and gave binh to popular 
legislative assemblies. 

« Note 3, page 177. » Pag«-s 177 and 178. Page 178. 



212 THE REVOLUTION. [1761. 

in 1763, the colonists looked forward to long years of prosperity and 
repose. A young monarch/ virtuous and of upright intentions, had been 
recently [1761] seated upon the British throne. Having confidence in his 
integrity, and having lately felt the justice of the government, under the direc- 
tion of Pitt,'^ they were disposed to forget past grievances ; and being identified 
■with the glory of England, now become one of the first powers on the earth, 
they were fond of their connection. But the serenity of the political sky soon 
disappeared, and it was not long before violent tempests were raging there. 
Even before the treaty at Paris, a cloud had arisen which portended future 
trouble. The war had exhausted the British treasury,^ and ministers devised 
various schemes for replenishing it. They had observed the resources of the 
colonists, as manifested by their efibrts during the recent struggle,* and as they 
were relieved from further hostilities by the subjugation of Canada' [1759], 
the government looked to them for aid. Instead of asking it as a favor ^ it was 
demanded as a right ; instead of inviting the colonial Assemblies to levy taxes 
and make appropriations, government assumed the right to tax their expanding 
commerce ; and then commenced a vigorous enforcement of existing revenue 
laws, which had hitherto been only nominally oppressive.' 

One of the first acts which revealed the intentions of Parliament to tax the 
colonies by enforcing the revenue laws, was the authorization, in 1761, of 
Writs of Assistance. These were general search-warrants, which not only 
allowed the king's ofiicers who held them, to break open any citizen's store or 
dwelling, to search for and seize foreign merchandise, on which a duty had not 
been paid, but compelled sherifis and others to assist in the work. The people 
could not brook such a system of petty oppression. The sanctities of private 
life might be invaded, at any time, by hirelings, and the assertion, based upon 
the guaranties of the British Constitution, that "every Englishman's house is 
his castle," would not be true. These writs were first issued in Massachusetts, 
and immediately great excitement prevailed. Their legality was questioned, and 
the matter was brought before a court held in the old town hall in Boston. 
The advocate for the Crown (Mr. Gridley) argued, that as Parliament was the 
supreme legislature for the whole British nation, and had authorized these 
writs, no subject had a right to complain. He was answered by James Otis/ 
_^ i . 

* George the Third. He was crowned m 1761, at the age of twenty years. He reigned ahnost 
sixty years, and died in 1820. ' Page 195. ^ Note 4. page 204. 

* French and Indian War. * Page 204. 

' Commercial restrictions were imposed upon the colonies as early as 1651 [note 4, page 109]. 
In 1660, 1672, 1676, 1691, and 1692, attempts were made by parliament to derive a revenue by a 
tariif-taxation upon the colonies. In 1696 a proposition was made to levy a direct tax upon the 
colonies. Then, not only in Britain, but in America, the power of parliament (wherem the colonista 
were not represented), to tax those colonies, was strenuously denied. 

' James Otis was born in Barnstable, Massachusetts, in 1725, and became the leader of the 
Eevolutionary party in that province, at the beginning. He was wounded by a blow from a cudgel, 
in the hands of a British official in 1769, and never fairly recovered. For years he was afflicted 
with occasional lunacy, and presented but a wreck of the orator and scholar. The following anec- 
dote is related of Mr. Otis, as illustrative of his ready use of Latin, even during moments of mental 
aberration. Men and boys, heartless or thoughtless, would sometimes make themselves merry at 
his expense, when he was seen in the streets afflicted with lunacy. On one occasion he was pass- 
ing a crockery store, when a young man, who had a knowledge of Latin, sprinkled some water 



.1775.] PRELIMINARY EVENTS. 213 

the younger, then advocate-general of the province. On that occasion, the 
intense fire of his patriotism beamed forth with inexpressible brilliancy, and his 
eloquence was like lightning, far-felt and consuming. On that day the trumpet 
of the Revolution was sounded. John Adams afterward said. "The seeds of 
patriots and heroes were then and there sown ;'"and when the orator exclaimed, 
" To my dying day I will oppose, with all the power and faculties God has given 
me, all such instruments of slavery on one hand, and villany on the other," the 
independence of the colonies was proclaimed.' From that day began the triumphs 
of the popular will. Very few writs were issued, and these were ineffectual. 

Young King George unwisely turned his back upon Pitt,* and listened to 
the councils of Bute,' an unprincipled Scotch adventurer, who had been his 
tutor. Disastrous consequences ensued. Weak and corrupt men controlled 
his cabinet, and the pliant Parliament approved of illiberal and unjust measures 
toward the colonists. The Sugar bill,* which had produced a great deal of ill- 
feeling in the colonies, was re-enacted ; and at the same time, George Grenville, 
then prime minister, proposed "certain stamp duties on the colonies." The 
subject was ieft open for consideration almost a year, when, in the spring of 
1765, in defiance of the universal opposition of the Americans, the famous 
Stamp Act, which declared that no legal instrument of writing should be valid, 
unless it bore a government stamp, became a law.^ Now was executed, without 
hesitation, a measure which no former ministry had possessed courage or reck- 
lessness enough to attempt.* 

upon him from a sprinkling-pot with which he was wetting the floor of the second story, at the samo 
time saying, Pluit tantum^ nescio quantum. Scis ne tu? "It rains so much, I know not how much. 
Do you know?" Otis immediately picked up a missile, and, hurling it through the window of the 
crockery store, it smashing everything in its way, exclaimed, Fregi tot, nescio quot. Scis Tie tuf 
■"I have broken so many, I know not how many. Do you know?" Mr. Otis, according to his 
expressed desire, was kiUed by lightning in 1782. See portrait at tlie head of this chapter. 

' Later than this [1768], Otis wrote to a friend in London, and said: "Our fathers were a good 
people ; we have been a free people, and if 3'ou will not let us remain so any longer, we shall be a 
great people, and the present measures can have no tendency but to hasten with great rapidity, 
events which every good and honest man would wish delayed for ages." He evidently alluded to 
the future independence of the colonies. 

* Pitt, disgusted by the ignorance and assurance of Bute and the misplaced confidence of the 
king, resigned his office, and retired to his country seat at Hayes. The king esteemed him highly, 
but was too much controlled by Bute to follow his own inclinations. It was not long, however, 
before public affairs became so complicated, that the king was compelled to caU upon the great 
commoner to untangle them. 

' Bute was a gay Scotch earl, poor and proud. He became a favorite with the mother of George 
the Third, was appointed his tutor, and acquired such influence over the mind of the prince, that on 
his accession to the throne, he made him his chief minister and adviser. The English people were 
much incensed ; and the unwise measures of the early years of George's reign, were properly laid 
to the charge of Bute. A placard was put up in London, with the words, " No Scotch minister — 
no petticoat government." The last clause referred to the influence of the queen mother. 

* A bill which imposed a duty upon sugar, cofiee, indigo, &c., imported into the colonies from 
the "West Indies. 

The stamps -vvrere upon blue paper, in the form seen in the engraving on page 213, and wero 
to be attached to every piece of paper or parchment, on which a legal instrument was written. 
Por these stamps government cliarged specific prices: for example, for a common property deed, 
one shilling and sixpence ; for a diploma or certificate of a college degree, two pounds, &c., &c. 

^ During Robert "Walpole's administration [1732], a stamp duty was proposed. He said, "I 
will leave the taxation of America to some of my successors, who have more courage than I have." 
-Sir "William Keith, governor of Pennsylvania, proposed such a tax in 1739. Franklin thought it 
just, when a delegate in the Colonial Congress at Albany, in 1754 [page 183]. But when it wa« 
'proposed to Pitt in 1759, he said, "I will never burn my fingers with an American Stamp Act." 



^ 



214 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1761. 



The colonists had watched with anxiety the growth of this new genn of 
oppression ; and the intelligence of the passage of the Act produced general 
and intense indignation in America. The hearts of the people were yet thrilled 
by the eloquent denunciations of Otis ; and soon Patrick Henry sent forth a^ 




response equally eloquent from the heaving bosom of the Virginia Assembly.* 
The people, in cities and villages, gathered in excited groups, and boldly 
expressed their indignation. The pulpit denounced the wicked scheme, and 

* Patrick Henry was a very Boanerp:es at the openinjr of the Revolution. He was born in 
Hanover County, Virginia, in 1736. In youth and manhood ho was exceedingly indolent and dulL 
At the age of twenty-seven, his eloquence suddenly beamed forth in a speech in court, in his native 
county, and he soon became a leading man in Virginia. He was elected the first Republican gov- 
ernor of his State, in 1776, and held that office again in 1784. He died in 1799, at the age of 
almost sLxty-three years. At the time alluded to in the text, Henry introduced a series of resolu- 
tions, highly tinctured with rebellious doctrines. He asserted the general rights of all the colonies; 
then the exclusive right of the Virginia Assembly to tax the people of that province, and boldlj 
declared that the people were not bound to obey any law relative to taxation, which did not pro- 
ceed from their representatives. Tlie last resolution declared that whoever should dissent from the 
doctrines inculcated in the others, should be considered an "enemy of the colonies." The mtroduc- 
tion of these resolutions produced great excitement and alarm. Henry supported them with all the 
power of his wonderful eloquence. Some rose from their seats, and otliers sat in breathless sOence. 
At length, when alluding to tyrants, he exclaimed, "Caesar had his Brutus, Charles the First his 
Cromwell, and George the Third" — there was a cry of " Treason ! Trea.son !" He paused a moment, 
and said — " may profit by their example. If that be treason, make the most of it." [See picture 
at the head of this chapter.] A part of his resolutions were adopted, and these formed the first 
gauntlet of defiance cast at the feet of the British monarch. Their power was felt throughout the. 
lani 




1115.'] PRELIMINARY EVENTS. 215 

associations of So7is of Liberty^ in everj colonj put forth their energies in 
defense of popular freedom. The press, then assuming great power, spoke out 
like an oracle of Truth. In several cities popular excite- 
ment created mobs, and violence ensued. The Staniji 
were seized on their arrival, and secreted or burnt 
Stamp distributors" were insulted and despised; and on 
the first of November, 1765, when the law was to taki 
effect, there were no officials courageous enough t- 
enforce it. 

The people did not confine their opposition to expres- 
sions at indignation meetings, and acts of violence. The 
public sentiment took a more dignified form, and assumed 
an aspect of nationality. There was a prevailing desire 

for a general Congress, and several colonies, in the midst of the great excite- 
ment, appointed delegates for that purpose. They met in the city of New 
York, on the 7th of October, 1765,^ continued in session fourteen days, and in 
three well -written documents," they ably set forth the grievances and the rights 
of the colonists, and petitioned the king and parliament for a redress of the 
former, and acknowledgment of the latter. The proceedings of this Second 
Colonial Congress^ were applauded by all the provincial Assemblies, and the 
people of America were as firmly united in heart and purpose then, as they 
were after the Declaration of Independence, more than ten years later. 

At length the momentous day — the first of November — arrived. It was 
observed as a day of fasting and mourning. Funeral processions paraded the 
streets of cities, and bells tolled funeral knells. The colors of sailing vessels 
were placed at half-mast, and the newspapers exhibited the black-line tokens 
of public grief The courts were now closed, legal marriages ceased, ships 
remained in port, and for some time all business was suspended. But the lull 
in the storm was of brief duration: The people were only gathering strength 
for more vigorous achievements in defense of their rights. The Sons of Lib- 
erty put forth new efforts ; mobs began to assail the residences of officials, and 
burn distinguished royalists, in effigy.* INIerchants entered into agreements 

' These associations were composed of popular leaders and others, who leagued with the 
avowed determination to resist oppression to tlie uttermost. After tlieir organization in the differ- 
ent colonies, the}- formed a sort of national league, and by continual correspondence, aided eflectu- 
aUy in preparing the way for the Revolution. 

' Men appointed by the crown to sell the government stamps, or stamped paper. 

* Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maiyland, and South 
Carolina, were represented. The Assemblies of those not represented, declared their readiness to 
agree to whatever measures the Congress miglit adopt. Timothy Ruggles, of Massachusetts (wha 
afterward commanded a corps of Tories) [note 4, page 22-i], presided. 

* A Declaration of Rights, written by John Cruger, of New York ; a Memorial to hath Houses oj 
Parliament, by Robert R. Livingston, of New Yorlc ; and a Petition to ih& king, by James Otis, of 
Massachusetts. ^ Page 183. 

' Public indignation is thus sometimes manifested. A figure of a man intended to represent 
the obnoxious individual, is paraded, and tlien hung upon a scaffold, or burned at a stake, as an 
intimation of the desers^ed fate of the person thus represented. It was a common practice in En- 
gland at the time in question, and has been often done in our own country since. Nowhere was 
popular indignation so warmly manifested as in New York. Cadwallader Colden, a venerable 
Scotchman of eighty years, was acting-governor of New York. He refused to dehver up the 



216 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1761. 



Hot to import goods from Great Britain while the obnoxious Act remained a law ; 
and domestic manufactures were commenced in almost every family/ The 
wealthiest vied with the middling classes in economy, and wore clothing of 
their own manufacture. That wool might not become scarce, the use of sheep 




flesh for food, was discouraged. Soon, from all classes in America, there went 
to the ears of the British ministry, a respectful but firm protest. It was 
seconded by the merchants and manufacturers of London, whose American 
trade was prostrated,'^ and the voice, thus made potential, was heard and heeded 
in high places. 

stamped paper on the demand of the people, when tl.iey proceeded to hang him in efSgy, near the 
spot where Leisler was executed [page 148] seventy-five years before. They also burned his fine 
coach in front of the fort, near the present Bowling Green, and upon the smokmg pile they cast hi3 
effigy- Golden was a man of great scientific attainments. He wrote a History of the Five Nations 
[page 23], and was in constant correspondence -with some of the most eminent philosophers and 
scholars of Europe. A life of Golden, from the pen of John W. Francis, M.D., L.LD., may be found 
in the American Medical and Philosophical Register, 1811. He died in September, 1776. 

' The newspapers of the day contain many laudatory notices of the conformity of wealthy 
people to these agreements. On one occasion, forty or filty young ladies, who called themselves 
"Daughters of Liberty," met at the house of the Rev. Mr. Morehead, in Boston, with their spinning- 
wheels, and spun two hundred and thirty-two skeins of yarn, during the day, and presented them 
to the pastor. It is said "there were upward of one hundred spinners in Mr. Morehead's Society." 
"Within eighteen months," wrote a gentleman at Newport, R. I., "four hundred and eighty-seven 
yards of cloth, and thirty-six pairs of stockings, have been spun and knit in the family of James 
Nixon, of this town." 

' Half a million of dollars were due them by the colonists, at that time, not a dime of which, 
could be collected under the existing state of things. 




1.115.] PflELIMINARY EVENTS. 217 

While these events were in progress, Grenville had been succeeded in office 
by the Marquis of Rockingham, a friend of the colonies, and an enlightened 
statesman. William Pitt,' who had been called from his retirement by the 
voice of the people, hoping much from the new ministry, appeared in Parlia- 
ment, and was there the earnest champion of the Amer- 
icans. Justice and expediency demanded a repeal of the 
Stamp Act, and early in January, 1766, a bill for that 
purpose was introduced into the House of Commons, and 
•was warmly supported by Pitt, Colonel Barrc, and others. 
Then Edmund Burke first appeared as the champion of 
right; and during the stormy debates on the subject, 
which ensued, he achieved some of those earliest and 
most wonderful triumphs of oratory, which established his 
fame, and endeared him to the American people.'' The 
obnoxious act was repealed on the 18th of March, 1766, when London ware- 
houses were illuminated, and flags decorated the shipping in the Thames. In 
America, public thanksgivings, bonfires, and illuminations, attested the general 
joy ; and Pitt,^ who had boldly declared his conviction that Parliament had no 
Hght to tax the colonies without their consent,* was lauded as a political Mes- 
siah. Non-importation associations were dissolved, business was resumed, and the 
Americans confidently expected justice from the mother country, and a speedy 
reconcihation. Alas ! the scene soon changed. 

Another storm soon began to lower. Pitt, himself tenacious of British 
honor, and doubtful of the passage of the Repeal Bill without some concessions, 
had appended to it an act, which declared that Parliament possessed the power 
" to bind the colonies, in all cases whatsoever." The egg of tyranny which 
lay concealed in this " declaratory act," as it was called, was not perceived by 
the colonists, while their eyes were filled with tears of joy ; but when calm re- 
flection came, they saw clearly that germ of future oppre*5sions, and were 
uneasy. They perceived the Repeal Bill to be only a truce in the war upon 
freedom in America, and they watched every movement of the government 
party with suspicion. Within a few months afterward, a brood of obnoxious 
measures were hatched from that egg, and aroused the fiercest indignation of 
the colonists. 

The American people, conscious of rectitude, were neither slow nor cautious 

* Note 2, page 213. 

' Edmund Burke was born in Ireland, in 1730. He became a lawyer, aD<5 was a very popular 
"Writer, as well as a speaker. He was in public office about thirty years, and died in 1797. 

^ William Pitt was born in England in 1708, and held many high offices of trust and emolu- 
ment. During an exciting debate in Parliament, on American affairs, in the spring of 1778, he 
swooned, and died within a montn afterward. 

* " Taxation," said Pitt, "is no part of the governing or legislative power. Taxes are the vol- 
untary gift or grant of the common=! alone." "I rejoice," he said, "that America has resisted. 
Three millions of people, so dead to all the feelings of liberty, as voluntarily to become Isaves, would 
have been fit instruments to make slaves of the rest." And Colonel Barre declared that the colon- 
ists were planted Ijy English oppression, grew by neglect, and in all the essential elements of a free 
people, were perfectly independent of Great Britain. He then warned the government to act justlj, 
«r the colonies would be lost to Great Britain forever. 



218 THE REVOLUTION. [1761. 

in exhibiting their indignation, and this boldness irritated their oppressors. A 
large portion of the House of Lords/ the whole bench of bishops/ and many of 
the Commons, were favorable to coercive measures toward the Americans. Not 
doubting the power of Parliament to tax them, they prevailed on the ministry 
to adopt new schemes for replenishing the exhausted treasury^ from the coffers 
of the colonists, and urged the justice of employing arms, if necessary, to en- 
force obedience. Troops were accordingly sent to America, in June, 1766 ; 
und a Mutiny Act was passed, which provided for their partial subsistence by 
the colonies.* The appearance of these troops in New York, and the order for 
the people to feed and shelter the avowed instruments of their own enslavement, 
produced violent outbreaks in that city, and burning indignation all over the 
land. The Assembly of New Yoi'k at once arrayed itself against the govern- 
ment, and refused compliance with tlie demands of the obnoxious act. 

In the midst of the darkness, light seemed to dawn upon the Americans. 
Early in the month of July, Pitt was called to the head of the British ministry, 
and on the 30th of that month, he was created Earl of Chatham. He opposed 
the new measures as unwise and unjust, and the colonists hoped for reconcilia- 
tion and repose. But Pitt could not always prevent mischief During his 
absence from Parliament, on account of sickness, the Chancellor of the Ex- 
chequer (Charles Townshend) coalesced with Grenville in bringing new tax- 
ation schemes before that body.^ A bill was passed in June, 1767, for levying 
duties upon tea, glass, paper, painters' colors, etc., which should be imported 
into the colonies. Another was passed, in July, for establishing a Board of 
Trade in the colonies, independent of colonial legislation, and for creating resi- 
dent commissioners of customs to enforce the revenue laws.' Then another, a 
few days later, which forbade the New York Assembly to perform any legisla- 
tive act whatever, until it should comply with the requisitions of the Mutmy 
Act. These taxation schemes, and blows at popular liberty, produced excite- 
ment throughout the colonies, almost as violent as those on account of the 
Stamp Act.' The colonial Assemblies boldly protested ; new non-importation 
associations were formed ; pamphlets and newspapers were filled with inflam- 
matory appeals to the people, defining their rights, and urging them to a united 
resistance / and early in 1768, almost every colonial Assembly had boldly ex- 

' Every peer in the British realm is a legislator bj virtue of his title ; and when they are assem- 
bled for legislative duties, they constitute the House of Lords, or upper branch of the legislature, 
answering, in some degree, to our Senate. 

^ Two archbishops, and twenty-four bishops of England and Wales, have a right to sit and vote 
in the House of Lords, and have the same political importance as the peers. By the act of union 
between Ireland and England, four "lords jpiritual" from among the archbishops and bishops of the 
former country, have a seat in the House of Lords. The "lords temporal and lords spiritual" con- 
stitute the House of Lords. The House of Commons is composed of meu elected by the people, and 
answers to the House of Representatives of our Federal Congress. = Page 212. 

* This act also allowed military officers, possessing a warrant from a justice of the peace, to 
break into any house where lie might suspect deserters were concealed. Lilie the Writs of Assist- 
ance [page 212], this power might be used for wicked purposes. 

^ In January, 1767, Grenville proposed a direct taxation of the colonies to the amount of twenty 
thousand dollars. 

* Note 6, page 212, and note 5, page 134. ' Page 215. 

* Among the most powerfiil of tliese appeals, were a series of letters, written by John Dicken- 
son, of Philadelphia, and entitled Letters of a Pennsylvania farmer. Like Paine's Crisis, ten yeaxi 



17'75.] 



PRELIMINARY 



EYENTS. 21^ 

pressed its conviction, that Parliament had no right to tax the colonies. These 
expressions were in response to a circular issued by Massachusetts [Feb., 1768] 
to the several Assemblies, asking their co-operation in obtaining a redress of 
grievances. That circular greatly offended the Ministry ; and the governor of 




"<5-Ji;.\ ,^v ^ 




Massachusetts was instructed to command the Assembly, in the king's name, to 
rescind the resolution adopting it. The Assembly, on the 30th of June follow- 
ing, passed an almost unanimous vote not to rescind/ and made this very order 
an evidence of the intentions of government to enslave the colonists, by restrain- 
ing the free speech and action of their representatives. 

The British Ministry, ignorant and careless concerning the character and 
temper of the Americans, disregarded the portentous warnings which every 
vessel from the New World bore to their ears. Having resolved on employing 
physical force in the maintenance of obedience, and not doubting its potency. 



later [note 4, page 250], these Letters produced a wide-spread and powerful effect on the public 
mind. James Otis asserted, in a pamphlet, that "taxes on trade [tariffs], if desio^ned to raise a 
revenue, were as much a violation of their rights as any other tax." John Dickenson was born in 
Maryland, in November, 1732. He studied law in England for three years, and made his first ap- 
pearance in pubUc life, as a member of the Pennsylvania Assembly. He was a member of tho 
Stamp Act Congress [page 215], and of the Continental Congress [page 226]. He was an eloquent 
speaker, and elegant writer. He was opposed to the independence of the colonies, but acquiesced, 
and was an able member of the convention that framed the Federal Constitution. He remained long 
in public life, and died in 1808, at the age of seventy-five years. 

' James Otis and Samuel Adams were the principal speakers on this occasion. " "When Lord 
Hillsboroutjh [colonial secretary] knows," said the former, "that we will not rescind oxir acts, he 
should appeal to Parliament to rescind theirs. Let Britons rescind their measures, or the colonies 
*re lost to them forever." 



220 THE REVOLUTION. [1161. 

they became less regardless of even the wrms of justice, and began to treat the 
colonists as rebellious subjects, rather than as free British brethren. Ministers 
sent orders to the colonial Assemblies, warning them not to imitate the factious 
disobedience of Massachusetts ; and the royal governors were ordered to enforce 
submission by all means in their power. The effect of these circulars was to 
disgust and irritate the Assemblies, and to stimulate their sympathy for Massa- 
chusetts, now made the special object of displeasure. 

It was in the midst of the general excitement, in May, 1768, that the new 
commissioners of customs arrived at Boston. They were regarded with as 
much contempt as were the tax-gatherers in Judea, in the time of our Saviour.' 
It was difficult to restrain the more ignorant and excitable portion of the pop- 
ulation from committing personal violence. A crisis soon arrived. In June, 
1768, the sloop Liberty^ belonging to John Hancock, one of the leaders of the 
popular mind in Boston,^ arrived at that port with a cargo of Madeira wine. 
The commissioners demanded the payment of duties, and when it was refused, 
they seized the vessel. The news spread over the town, and the people re- 
solved on immediate and effectual resistance. An assemblage of citizens soon 
became a mob, who dragged a custom-house boat through the town, burned it 
upon the Common, assailed the commissioners, damaged their houses, and com- 
pelled them to seek safety in Castle William, a small fortress at the entrance 
to the harbor.' Alarmed by these demonstrations of the popular feeling. Gov- 
ernor Bernard unwisely invited General Gage,^ then in command of British 
troops at Halifax, to bring soldiers to Boston to overawe the inhabitants.' They 
came in September [Sept. 27, 1768], seven hundred in number, and on a quiet 
Sabbath morning, landed under cover of the cannons of the British ships which 
brought them, and with drums beating, and colors flying, they marched to the 
Common," with all the parade of a victorious army entering a conquered city. 
Religion, popular freedom, patriotism, were all outraged, and the cup of the 
people s indignation was full.'^ The colonists were taught the bitter, but neces- 
sary lesson, that armed resistance must oppose armed oppression.^ 

Like the Assembly of New York, that of Massachusetts refused to afford 



^ The 'publicans, or toll-gatherers of Judea, being a gtanding monument of the degradation of the 
Jews under the Roman yoke, were abhorred. One of the accusations against our Saviour was, that 
he did " eat with publicans and sinners." ' Page 231. 

' About three miles south-east from Boston. The fortress was ceded to the United States in 
1*798; and the following j^ear it was visited by President Adams, and named Fort Independence, its 
present title. In connection with Castle "William, we find the first mention of the tune of " Yankee 
Doodle." In the Boston Journal of the Times, September 29, 1768, is the following: "The fleet 
was brought to anchor near Castle William ; that night there was throwing of sky-rockets ; and 
those passing in boats observed great rejoicings, and that the Yankee Doodle Song was the capital 
piece in the band of music." * Page 186. 

'' The British ministry had already resolved to send troops to Boston to subdue the rebellioufl 
propensities of the people. 

" A large public park on the southern slope of Beacon HilL 

'' As the people refused to supply the troops with quarters, they were placed, some in the State 
House, some in Faneuil Hall [page 225], and others in tents on the Common. Cannons were 
planted at different points; sentinels challenged the citizens as they passed; and the whole town 
bad the appearance of a camp. 

* There were, at that time, full two hundred thousaa'd men in the colonies capable of bearing 



ms.] PRELIMINARY EVENTS. 221 

food and shelter for the royal troops in that province, and for this offense, Par- 
liament, now become the supple instrument of the crown, censured their dis- 
obedience, approved of coercive measures, and, by resolution, prayed the king 
to revive a long obsolete statute of Henry the Eighth, by which the governor 
of the refractory colony should be required to arrest, and send to England for 
trial, on a charge of treason, the ringleaders in the recent tumults. The colo- 
nial Assembly indignantly responded, by re-asserting the chartered privileges 
of the people, and denying the right of the king to take an offender from the 
country, for trial. And in the House of Commons a powerful minority battled 
manfully for the Americans. Burke pronounced the idea of reviving that old 
statute, as "horrible." "Can you not trust the juries of that country?" he 
asked. "If you have not a party among two millions of people, you must 
either change your plans of government, or renounce the colonies forever." 
Even Grenville, the author of the Stamp Act, opposed the measure, yet a ma- 
jority voted in favor of the resolution, on the 26th of January, 1769. 

The British troops continued to be a constant source of irritation, while, 
month after month, the colonies were agitated by disputes with the royal gov- 
ernors, the petty tyranny of lesser officials, and the interference of the imperial 
government with colonial legislation. The Assembly of Massachusetts, encour- 
aged by the expressed sympathy of the other colonies, firmly refused to appro- 
priate a single dollar for the support of the troops. They even demanded their 
withdrawal from the city, and refused to transact any legislative business while 
they remained. Daily occurrences exasperated the people against the troops, 
and finally, on the 2d of March, 1770, an event, apparently trifling in its char- 
acter, led to bloodshed in the streets of Boston. A rope-maker quarreled with 
a soldier, and struck him. Out of this affray grew a fight between several sol- 
diers and rope-makers. The latter were beaten, and the result aroused the 
vengeance of the more excitable portion of the inhabitants. A few evenings 
afterward [March 5], about seven hundred of them assembled in the streets, 
for the avowed purpose of attacking the troops.* A sentinel was assaulted near 
the custom-house, when Captain Preston, commander of the guard, went to his 
rescue with eight armed men. The mob dared the soldiers to fire, and attacked 
them with stones, pieces of ice, and other missiles. One of the soldiers who 
received a blow, fired, and his six companions also discharged their guns. 
Three of the citizens were killed, and five were danger- 
ously wounded.' The mob instantly retreated, when all 

' These were addressed by a tall man, disguised by a white wig and 
a scarlet cloak, who closed his harangue by shouting, " To the main 
guard! to the main guard!" and then disappeared. It was always be- 
lieved that the tall man was Samuel Adams, one of the most inflexible 
patriots of the Revolution, and at that time a popular leader. He was 
a descendant of one of the early Puritans [page 75], and was bom in 
Boston in 1722. He was one of the signers of the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence ; was afterward governor of Massachusetts ; and died in 
1803. A purer patriot than Samuel Adams, never lived. SAMUEL ADAMS. 

* The leader of the mob was a powerful mulatto, named Crispus 
Attucks. He and Samuel Gray and James Caldwell, were killed instantly ; two others received 
mortal wounds. 




222 THE REVOLUTION. [1761. 

the bells of the city rang an alarum, and in less than an hour several thou- 
sands of exasperated citizens were in the streets. A terrible scene of blood 
would have ensued, had not Governor, Hutchinson assured the people that 
justice should be vindicated in the morning. They retired, but with firm re- 
solves not to endure the military despotism any longer. 

The morning of the 6th of March was clear and frosty. At an early hour 
Governor Hutchinson was called upon to fulfill his promise. The people de- 
manded the instant removal of the troops from Boston, and the trial of Captain 
Preston and his men, for murder. These demands were complied with. The 
troops were removed to Castle William [March 12, 1770], and Preston, ably 
defended by John Adams and Josiah Quincy, two of the popular leaders, was 
tried and acquitted, with six of his men, by a Boston jury. The other two sol- 
diers were found guilty of manslaughter. This result was a comment on the 
enforcement of the statute of Henry the Eighth, highly favorable to the Amer- 
icans. It was so regarded in England, and was used with good efiect by the 
opposition in Parliament. It showed that in the midst of popular excitement, 
the strong conservative principles of justice bore rule. The victims of the riot 
were regarded as martyrs to liberty,' and for many years, the memory of the 
"Boston Massacre," as it was called, was kept alive by anniversary orations in 
the city and vicinity. 

Perceiving the will and the power of the colonists in resisting taxation with- 
out their consent, the British ministry now wavered. On the very day of the 
bloody riot in Boston [March 5], Lord North, who was then the English prime 
minister, proposed to Parliament a repeal of all duties imposed by the act of 
1767,^ except that upon tea. An act to that effect was passed a month after- 
ward [April 12]. This concession was wrung from the minister partly by the 
clamor of English merchants and manufacturers, who again felt severely the 
operations of the non-importation associations in America. As tea was a lux- 
ury. North supposed the colonists would not object to the small duty laid upon 
that article, and he retained it as a standing assertion of the right of Parliament 
to impose such duties. The minister entirely mistook the character of the peo- 
ple he was dealing with. It was not the petty amount of duties of which they 
complained, for all the taxes yet imposed were not in the least burdensome to 
them. They were contending for a great principle^ which lay at the foundation 
of their liberties ; and they regarded the imposition of a duty upon one article 
as much a violation of their sacred rights, as if ten were included. They ac- 
cepted the ministerial concession, but, asserting their rights, continued their 
non-importation league against the purchase and use of tea.^ 

^ They were buried with great parade. All the bells of Boston and vicinity tolled a funeral 
knell while the procession was moving ; and as intended, the affair made a deep impression on the 
public mind. , " Page 218. 

^ Even before North's proposition was made to Parliament, special agreements concerning the 
disuse of tea, had been made. Already the popular feeling on this subject had been manifested to- 
ward a Boston merchant wlio continued to sell tea. A company of half-grown boys placed an efBgy 
near his door, wath a finger upon it pointing toward his store. "While a man was attempting to 
pull it down, he was pelted with dirt and stones. He ran into the store, and seizing a gun, dis- 
charged its contents among the crowd. A boy named Snyder was killed, and Christopher Gore 



m 



1V.-5.] PRELIMINARY EVENTS. 223 

The spirit of opposition was not confined to the more northern and eastern 
colonies. It was rife below the Roanoke, and was boldly made manifest when 
occasion required. In 1771, the Carolinas, hitherto exempted from violent out- 
bursts of popular indignation, although never wanting in zeal in opposing the 
Stamp Act, and kindred measures, became the theater of great excitement. To 
gatisfy the rapacity and pride of royal governors, the industry of the province 
of North Carolina, especially, was enormously taxed.' The oppression was real, 
not an abstract principle, as at the North. The people iu the interior at length 
formed associations, designed to resist unjust taxation, and to control public 
affairs. They called themselves Regulators ; and in 1771, they were too nu- 
merous to be overawed by local magistrates. Their operations assumed the 
character of open rebellion ; and in the spring of that year. Governor Tryon" 
marched into that region with an armed force, to subdue them. They met him 
upon Alamance Creek, in Alamance county, on the 16th of May, and there a 
bloody skirmish ensued. The Regulators were subdued and dispersed, and 
Tryon marched back in triumph to the sea-board, after hanging six of the lead- 
ers, on the 19th of June following. These events aroused, throughout the South, 
the fiercest hatred of British power, and stimulated that earnest patriotism so 
early displayed by the people below the Roanoke, when the Revolution broke out.^ 

The upper part of Narraganset Bay exhibited a scene, in the month of 
June, 1772, which produced much excitement, and widened the breach between 
Great Britain and her colonies. The commander of the British armed schooner 
Gaspc. stationed there to assist the commissioners of customs* in enforcing the 
revenue laws, annoyed the American navigators by haughtily commanding them 
to lower their colors when they passed his vessel, in token of obedience. The 
William Tells of the bay refused to bow to the cap of this petty Gesler.^ For 
such disobedience, a Providence sloop was chased by the schooner. The latter 
grounded upon a low sandy point; and on that night [June 9, 1772], sixty-four 
armed men went down from Providence in boats, captured the people on board 
the Gasp^^, and burned the vessel. Although a large reward was offered for the 
perpetrators (who were well known in Providence^), they were never betrayed. 

(afterward governor of Massachusetts) was wounded. The affair produced great excitement. At 
about the same time, three hundred " mistresses of families" in Boston signed a pledge of total ab- 
stinence from the use of tea, while the duty remained upon it. A few days afterward a large num- 
ber of young ladies signed a similar pledge. 

' Governor Tryon caused a palace to be erected for his residence, at Newbern, at a cost of 
$75,000, for the payment of which the province was taxed. This was in 1768, and was one of the 
principal causes of discontent, which produced the outbreak here mentioned. 

= Page 248. * Page 237. " Page 220. 

^ Gesler was an Austrian governor of one of the cantons of Switzerland. He placed liis cap on 
a pole, at a gate of tlie town, and ordered all to bow to it, when they should enter. William Tell, a 
brave leader of the people, refused. He was imprisoned for disobedience, escaped, aroused hia 
countrymen to arms, who drove their Austrian masters out of the land, and achieved the indepen- 
dence of Switzerland. 

" One of the leaders was Abraham Wliipple, a naval commander during the Revolution [page 
MO]. Several others were afterward distinguished for bravery during that struggle. Four years 
afterward, when Sir James "Wallace, a British commander, was in the vicinity of Newport, Whipple 
became known as the leader of the attack on the Gaspe. Wallace sent him the following letter; 
"You, Abraham Whipple, on the 9th of J>me, 1772, burned his majesty's vessel, the Gaspe, and I 
will hang you at the yard-arm." To this Whipple replied : " To Sir James Wallace. Sir-. Always 
«atch a man before you hang him. — ^Abraham Whipple." 




LORD NORTH. 



224 THE REVOLUTION. [176L 

These rebellious acts, so significant of the temper of the Americans, greatly 
perplexed the British ministry. Lord North' -would gladly have conciliated 
them, but he was pledged by words and acts to the maintenance of the asserted 
principle, that Parliament had the undoubted right to tax the colonies without 
their consent. He labored hard to perceive some method by which conciliation 
and parliamentary supremacy might be made to harmonize, and early in 1773, 
a new thought upon taxation entered his brain. The East India Company,^ 
having lost their valuable tea customers in America, by the operation of the 
non-importation associations, and having more than seventeen millions of pounda 
of the article in their warehouses in England, petitioned Parliament to take off 
the duty of three pence a pound, levied upon its importation into America. 
The company agreed to pay the government more than 
an equal amount, in export duty, if the change should be 
made. Here was an excellent opportunity for the gov- 
ernment to act justly and wisely, and to produce a per- 
fect reconciliation; but the stupid ministry, fearing it 
might be considered a submission to " rebellious sub- 
jects," refused the olive branch of peace. Continuing 
to misapprehend the real question at issue. North intro- 
duced a bill into Parliament, allowing the company ta 
export their teas to America on their own account, with- 
out paying an export duty. As this would make tea cheaper in America than 
in England, he concluded the Americans would not object to paying the three 
pence duty. This concession to a commercial monopoly, while spurning the 
appeals of a great principle, only created contempt and indignation throughout 
the colonies. 

Blind as the minister, the East India Company now regarded the American 
market as open for their tea, and soon after the passage of the bill [May 10, 
1773], several large ships, heavily laden with the article, were on their way 
across the Atlantic. Intelligence of these movements reached America before 
the arrival of any of the ships, and the people in most of the sea-board towns, 
where consignments of tea had been made, resolved that it should not even be 
landed. The ships which arrived at New York and Philadelphia, returned to 
England with their cargoes. At Charleston it was landed, but was not allowed 
to be sold ; while at Boston, the attempts of the governor and his friends,' who 

* Frederick, Earl of Guilford (Lord North), was a man of talent, sincerely attached to English 
liberty, and conscientious in the performanance of his duties. Like many other statesmen of his 
time, he utterly misapprehended the character of the American people, and could not perceive the 
justice of their claims. He was prime minister during the whole of our War for Independence. 
He was afflicted with blmdness durmg the last years of his life. He died in July, 1792, at the age 
of sixty years. 

* The English East India Company was formed and chartered in 1600, for the purpose of 
carrying on a trade by sea, between England and the countries lying east of the Cape of Good 
Hope [note 1, page 37]. It continued prosperous; and about the middle of the last century, the 
governor of its stations in India, under the pretense of obtaining security for their trade, subdued 
Bmall territories, and thus planted the foundation of that great British empu-e in the East, which 
now comprises the whole of Hindostan, from Cape Comorin to the Himalaya mountains, with a 
population of more than one hundred and twenty millions of people. 

' The public mind in Massachusetts was greatly inflamed against Governor Hutchinaon at this 




1776.1 PRELIMINARY EVENTS. 225 

werP consignees, to land the tea in defiance of the public feeling, resulted in the 

destruction of a large quantity of it. On a cold moonlight night [December 

16, 1773], at the close of the last of several spirited 

meetings of the citizens held at Faneuil Hall,* a party 

of about sixty persons, some disguised as Indians, 

rushed on board two vessels in the harbor, laden with 

tea, tore open the hatches, and in the course of two 

hours, three hundred and forty-two chests containing 

the proscribed article, were broken open, and their 

contents cast into the water. This event produced a 

powerful sensation throughout the British realm, and 

led to very important results. 

While the American colonies, and even Canada, Nova Scotia, and the 
British West Indies, sympathized with the Bostonians, and could not censure 
them, the exasperated government adopted retaliatory measures, notwithstand- 
ing payment for all damage to their property was promised to the East India 
Company. Parliament, by enactment [March 7, 1774], ordered the port of 
Boston to be closed against all commercial transactions whatever, and the re- 
moval of the custom-house, courts of justice, and other public offices, to Salem. 
The Salem people patriotically refused the proffered advantage at the expense 
of their neighbors ; and the inhabitants of Marblehead, fifteen miles distant, 
ofiered the free use of their harbor and wharves, to the merchants of Boston. 
Soon after the passage of the Boston Port Bill, as it was called, another act, 
which leveled a blow at the charter of Massachusetts, was made a law [March 
28, 1774]. It was equivalent to a total subversion of the charter, inasmuch 
as it deprived the people of many of the dearest privileges guarantied by that 
instrument.^ A third retaliatory act was passed on the 21st of April, provid- 
ing for the trial, in England, of all persons charged in the colonies with mur- 
ders committed in support of government, giving, as Colonel Barr^ said, 
•^encouragement to military insolence already so insupportable." A fourth 
bill, providing for the quartering of ^roops in America, was also passed by 
large majorities m both Houses of Parliament ; and in anticipation of rebellion 
in America, a fifth act was passed, making great concessions to the Roman 
Catholics in Canada, known as the Quebec Act. This excited the animosity of 



time, whose letters to a member of Parliament, recommending stringent moasures toward the coL 
onies, had been procured in England, and sent to the speaker of the colonial Assembly, bj Dr. 
Franklin. At about the same time. Parliament had passed a law, making the governor and judge.s 
of Massachusetts independent of the Assembly for their salaries, these being paid out of the reve- 
nues in the hands of the commissioners of customs. This removal of these officials beyond all de- 
pendence upon the people, constituted them fit instruments of the crown for oppressing the inhabit- 
ants, and in that aspect the colonists viewed the measure, and condemed it. 

' Because the Revolutionary meetings in Boston were held in Faneuil Hall, it was (and still is) 
called The Cradle of Liberty. It was built, and presented to the town, by Peter Faneuil, in 1742. 
The picture shows its form during the Revohition. The vane on the steeple, in the form of a grass- 
hopper (syraboUcal of devouring), yet [1867] holds its original place. 

^ It empowered sheriffs appointed by the crown, to select juries, instead of leaving that power 
with the selectmen of the towns, who were chosen by the people. It also prohibited all town 
meetings and other gatherings. It provided for the appointment of the council judges, justices of 
thie peace, etc., by tie crown or its representative. 

15 



226 THE REVOLUTION. [1761. 

all Protestants. These msasures created universal indignation toward the gov- 
ernment, and sympathy for the people of Boston. 

On the first of June, 1774, the Boston Port Bill went into operation. It 
was a heavy blow for the doomed town. Business was crushed, and great suf- 
fering ensued. The utter prostration of trade soon produced wide-spread dis- 
tress. The rich, deprived of their rents, became straitened ; and the poor, 
denied the privilege of laboring, were reduced to beggary. All classes felt the 
scourge of the oppressor, but bore it with remarkable fortitude. They were 
conscious of being right, and everywhere, tokens of the liveliest sympathy were 
manifested. Flour, rice, cereal grains, fuel, and money, were sent to the suffer- 
ing people from the different colonies ; and the city of London, in its corporate 
capacity, subscribed one hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the poor of Boston. 

For the purpose of enforcing these oppressive laws. General Gage, the com- 
mander-in-chief of the British army in America,' was appointed governor of 
Massachusetts, and an additional military force was ordered to Boston. These 
coercive demonstrations greatly increased the public irritation, and diminished 
the hopes of reconciliation. Slavish submission or armed resistance, was now 
the alternative presented to the American people. Committees of correspond- 
ence which had been formed in every colony in 1773,^ had been busy in the 
interchange of sentiments and opinions, and throughout the entire community 
of Anglo-Americans there was evidently a general consonance of feeling, favor- 
able to united efforts in opposing the augmenting tyranny of Great Britain. 
Yet they hesitated, and resolved to deliberate in solemn 

"^ ^^'^■^^— — ---^ council before they should appeal to " the last argument 

' .^ » Tk I of kings.'" 

The patriots of Massachusetts stood not alone in 
In all the colonies the Whigs* were 



sxAKE DEVICE. j^g inflexible and bold, and as valiantly defied the power 

of royal governors, when unduly exercised. But those of Massachusetts, being 
the special objects of ministerial vengeance, suffered more, and required more 
boldness to act among bristling bayonets and shotted cannons, prepared ex- 
pressly for their bosoms. Yet they gr^ stronger every day under persecu- 
tion, and bolder as the frowns of British power became darker.' Even while 

^ Page 220. 

" At a consultation of leading: members of the Virginia House of Assembh-, in March, 1773, held 
i» the old Raleigh tavern at Williamsburg, at which Patrick Henry, Thomas Jeflerson, Richard 
Henry Lee, and others, were present, it was agreed to submit a resolution in the House the follow- 
ing day, appointing a committee of vigilance and correspondence, and recommending the same to 
the other colonies. The measure was carried, and these committees formed one of the most power- 
ful engines in carrying on the work of the Revolution. Similar committees had already been formed 
in several towns in Massachusetts. 

* These words, in Latin, were often placed upon cannon. Before the armory, at Richmond, 
Virginia, was destroyed, in April, 1865, several old French cannons, made of brass, were there, on 
two of which these words appeared. They also appear upon some French cannon at West Point. 

* The terms. Whig and Tory, liad long been used in England as titles of political parties. The 
former denoted the opposers of royalty; the latter indicated its supporters. These terms were 
introduced into America two or three years before the Revolution broke out, and became the dis- 
tinctive titles of the patriots and loyalists. 

' Even the children seemed to lose theu: timidity, and became bolder. They nobly exhibited it 



.1775.] 



PRELIMINARY EVENTS. 



227 



.troops, to overawe them were parading the streets of Boston, sturdy representa- 
tives of the people assembled at Salem,' and sent forth an invitation to all the 
colonies to appoint delegates to meet in a general Congress at Philadelphia on 
the 5th of September following. It met with a hearty response from twelve of 




the thirteen colonies, and the Press and the Pulpit seconded the measures with 
great emphasis. Some newspapers bore a significant device. It was a snake 
cut into thirteen parts, each part bearing the initials of a colony upon it, as 
seen in the engraving.' Under these were the significant words, Unite or die. 
The delegates were all appointed before the close of August, and the First 



on one occasion. They were in the habit of building mounds of snow in winter, on Boston Com- 
mon. These the soldiers battered down, so as to annoy the boys. This being repeated, a meeting 
of larger boys was held, and a deputation was sent to General Gage, to remonstrate. " We come, 
sir," said the tallest boy, "to demand satisfaction." "What!" exclaimed Gage; "have your 
fathers been teaching j^ou rebellion, and sent you here to exhibit it?" " Nobody sent us here, sir," 
said the boy. while his eyes flashed with indignation. " We have never insulted nor injured your 
troops, but they have trodden down our snow-hills, and broken the ice on our skating-grounds. 
We complained ; and, calling us young rebels, told us to help ourselves if we could. We told the 
captain of this, and he laughed at us. Yesterday our works were destroyed for the third time, and 
we will bear it no longer." Gage admired the spirit of the boys, promised them rediess, and turn- 
ing to an officer, he said, "The very children here draw in a love of liberty with the air they 
breathe " 

' At that meeting of the General Assembly of Massachusetts, the patriots matured a plan for a 
general Congress, provided for munitions of war to resist British power in their own province, and 
formed a general non-importation league for the whole country. In the midst of their proceedings. 
General Gage sent his secrptary to dissolve them, but the doors of the Assembly chamber were 
locked, and the key was in Samuel Adams's pocket. Having finished their business, the Assembly 
adjourned, and thus ended the last session of that body, under a royal governor. * Page 226. 




228 THE REVOLUTION. [I'TSr. 

Continental Congress* assembled in Carpenter's Hall, Philadelphia, on the 
5th of September, 1774, the day named in the circular. All but Georgia were 
represented. Pejton Randolph, of Virginia, was appointed President, and 
Charles Thomson of Pennsylvania, Secretary.'' The regular business of the 
Congress commenced on the morning of the 7th, ^ after an impressive prayer for 
Divine guidance, uttered by the Rev. Jacob Duchc,'' of Philadelphia. They- 
remained in session until the 26th of October, during which time they matured 
measures for future action, which met with the general approbation of the 
^^ J- American people.^ They prepared and put forth sev- 

eral State papers, ° marked by such signal ability and 
wisdom, as to draw from the Earl of Chatham these 
words in the House of Lords : "I must declare and 
avow, that in all my reading and study of history — 
(and it has been my favorite study — I have read Thu- 
cydides, and have studied and admired the master 
States of the world) — that for solidity of reasoning, 
force of sagacity, and wisdom of conclusion, under 
■ such a complication of circumstances, no nation or 

body of men can stand in preference to the general Congress at Philadelphia.'' 
In all its proceedings Congress manifested decorum, firmness,^ moderation, 

' This name was given to distinguish it from the two colonial Congresses [pages 183 and 215] 
already held; one at Albany in 1754, the other at New York in 1765. 

"^ Thomson was secretary of Congress, perpetually, from 1774, until the adoption of the Federal 
Constitution, and the organization of the new government, in 1789. Watson relates that Thomson 
had just come into PMadelphia, with his bride, and was aUghting from his chaise, when a messen- 
ger from the delegates in Carpenter's Hall came to him, and said they wanted him to come and 
take minutes of their proceedings, as he wa? an expert at such business. For his first year's serv- 
ice, he received no pay. So Congress infoi .njd his wife that they wished to compensate Tier for the 
absence of her husband during that time, and wished her to name what kind of a piece of plate abe 
would like to receive. She chose an wrre, and that silver vessel is j;et in the family. Thomson was 
bom in Ireland in 1730, came to America when eleven years of age, and died in 1824, at the age 
of ninety-four years. 

* When the delegates had assembled on the 5th, no one seemed incUned to break the silence, 
and deep anxiety was depicted in every countenance. Soon a grave-looking man, in a suit of 
"minister's gray," and unpowdered wig, arose, and, with a sweet, musical voice, he uttered a few 
eloquent words, that electrified the whole audience. " Who is he ?" was a question that went 
fi'om hp to lip. A few who knew him, answered, "It is Patrick Henry, of Virginia." There was 
no longer any hesitation. He who, nine years before, had cast the gauntlet of defiance at the feet 
of British power, now set in motion that august machinery of civil power, which assisted in work- 
ing out the independence of the United States. 

■• Duche was a minister of the Church of England, and afterward became a Tory. 

* They prepared a plan for a general commercial non-intercourse with Great Britain and her 
West India possessions, wliich was called 77ie Atnerican Association, and was reconunended for- 
adoption throughout the country. It consisted of fourteen articles. In addition to the non-inter- 
course provisions, it was recommended to abandon the slave-trade, to improve the breed of sheep, 
to abstain from all extravagance in living and indulgence in horse-racing, etc., and the appointment 
of a committee in every town to promote conformity to the requirements of the Association. It 
was signed by the fifty-two members present. 

* A Bill of Eights; an address to the people of Great Britain, written by John Jay; another to 
the several Anglo-American colonies, written by WiUiam Livmgston ; another to the inhabitants of 
Quebec, and a petition to the king. In these, the grievances and the righis of the colonies were ably 
set forth. 

' He also said, in a letter to Stephen Sayre, on the 24th of December, 1774: "I have not 
words to express my satisfaction that the Congress has conducted this most arduous and delicate 
business, with such manly wisdom and calm resolution, as do the highest honor to their deliberation." 

* On the 8th of October, they unanimously resolved, "That this Congress approve the opposition. 



1715.] FIRST YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. £29 

and loyalty ; and when the delegates resolved to adjourn, to meet again at the 
same place on the 10th of May following [1775], unless the desired redress of 
grievances should be obtained, they did so with an earnest hope that a reconcil- 
iation might speedily take place, and render another national council unneces- 
sary. But they were doomed to bitter disappointment. Great Britain waa 
blind and stubborn still. 



CHAPTER II. 

FIRST TEAR OP THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. [1175.] 

Persuaded that war was inevitable, the colonists began to prepare for that 
event, during the summer and autumn of 1774. They practiced daily in mil- 
itary exercises ; the manufacture of arms and gunpowder was encouiuged ; and 
throughout Massachusetts in particular, where the heel of the oppressor bore 
heaviest, the people were enrolled in companies. Fathers and sons, encouraged 
by the gentler sex, received lessons together in the art of war, and prepared to 
take arms at a moment's warning. From this circumstance, they were called 
minute-men. The Whig' journals grew bolder every hour. Epigrams, para- 
bles, sonnets, dialogues, and every form of literary expression, remarkable for 
point and terseness, filled their columns. We give a single specimen of some 
of the rhymes of the day : 

"the quarrel with AMERICA FAIRLY STATED. 

" Rudely forced to drink tea, Massachusetts in anger 
Spills tiie tea on J»hn Bull ; John falls on to bang her ; 
Massachusetts, enraged, calls her neighbors to aid, 
And give Master John a severe bastinade. 
Now, good men of the law ! pray, who is in fault, 
The one who began or resents the assault?" 

The Massachusetts leaders, in the mean while, were laboring, with intense 
leal, to place the province in a condition to rise in open and united rebellion, 
when necessity should demand. And all over the land, the provincial assem- 
blies, speakers at public gatherings, and from the pulpit, were boldly proclaim- 
ing the right of resistance. These demonstrations alarmed General Gage,^ and 
he commenced fortifying Boston Neck.^ He also seized and conveyed to 

of the inhabitants of Massachusetts Bay, to the execution of the late acts of Parliament, and if the 
same shall be attempted to bo carried into execution by force, in such case all America ought to 
support them in their opposition." This resolution, in letter and spirit, was the embodiment of the 
revolutionary sentiment. ' Note 4, page 226. 

" Thomas Gage was a native of England. He was governor of Montreal [page 203] in 1760, and 
commander-in-chief of the British army in America, in 1763. He was appointed governor of 
Massachusetts, in 1774; left America in 1775; and died in 1787. 

' The peninsula of Boston was originally connected with the main land by a narrow isthmus 
called the Neck. It has been greatly widened by tilling in the marginal morasses; and over it now 
..passes the line avenue which connects the city with Roxbury, on the main. 



230 THE UKTOLUTION. [1175^ 

the city large quantities of ammunition found in the neighboring villages, and 
employed stringent measures for preventing intercourse between the patriots im 
the city and in the country. The exasperated people needed but the electric 
spark of even a shght offense to kindle their suppressed indignation into a 
blaze. They were ready to sound the battle-cry, and evoke the sword of rebel- 
lion from its scabbard ; and they were even anxious to attack the soldiers in* 
Boston, but they were restrained by prudent conselors.' 

A rumor went abroad on the third of September, that British ships were 
cannonading Boston. From the shores of I^ong Island Sound to the green; 
hills of Berkshire, " To arms ! to arms !" was the universal shout. Instantly, 
on every side, men of all ages were seen cleansing and burnishing their weap- 
ons ; and within two days, full thirty thousand minute-men were under arms, 
and hastening toward that city. They were met by a contradiction of the 
rumor; but the event conveyed such a portentous lesson to Gage, that he 
pushed forward his military operations with as much vigor as the opposition of 
the people would allow.^ He thought it expedient to be more conciliatory ; 
and he summoned the colonial Assembly to meet at Salem on the 5th of Octo- 
ber. Then dreading their presence, he revoked the order. Ninety delegates 
met, however, and organized by the appointment of John Hancock' president. 
They then went to Cambridge, where they formed a Provincial Congress, inde- 
pendent of royal authority (the first in America), and labored earnestly in 
preparations for that armed resistance, now become a stern necessity. They 
made provisions for an army of twelve thousand men ; solicited other New En- 
gland colonies to augment it to twenty thousand; and appointed Jedediah 
Preble and Artemas Ward* men of experience in the French and Indian war,' 
generals of all the troops that might be raised. . 

The Americans were now fairly aroused to action. They had counted the 
cost of armed rebellion, and were fully resolved to meet it. The defiant 
position of the colonists arrested the attention of all Europe. When the Brit- 
ish Parliament assembled early in 1775, that body presented a scene of great 
excitement. Dr. Franklin and others,^ then in England, had given a wide cir- 
culation to the State papers put forth by the Continental Congress ;^ and the 

' Many hundreds of armed men assembled at Cambridge. At Charlestown, the people tookr 
possession of the arsenal, after Gage had carried off the powder. At Portsmouth, N. H., they cap- 
tured the fort, and carried off the ammunition. At Newport, R. I., the people seized the po«-der, 
and took possession of forty pieces of cannon at the entrance of the harbor. In New York, Phila- 
delphia, AnnapoUs, "Williamsburg, Charleston, and Savannah, the people took active defensive 
measures, and the whole country was in a blaze of indignation. 

" Carpenters refused to work on the fortilications, and much of the material was destroyed by 
fire, at night, in spite of the vigilance of the guards. Gage sent to New York for timber and work- 
men ; but the people there would not permit either to leave their port. 

' John Hancock was one of the most popular of the New England patriots, throughout the 
whole war. He was born in Braintree, Massachusetts, in 1737, was educated at Harvard College; 
became a counting-room clerk to his uncle, and inherited that gentleman's great wealth. He 
entered public life early ; was a representative in the Continental Congress, and was its president 
when the Declaration of Independence was adopted. He was afterward governor of Massachusetts. 
Mr. Hancock died in October, 1793, at the age of fifty-six years. 

* Note 5, page 238. " Page 179. 

• Dr. Franklin hnd then been agent in England, for several of the colonies, for about ten year&. 
' Note 6, page 228. 



1715.] 



FIRST TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



231 



English mind was already favorably influenced in favor of the Americana. 
Pitt came on crutches' from his retirement, to cast the weight of his mighty 
influence into the scale of justice, by action in the House of Lords. He pro- 
posed [January 7, 1775] conciliatory measures. They were rejected, as well 








as others offered by Burke, Conway, and Hartly ; and in their stead, Parlia- 
ment, in March, struck another severe blow at the industry of New England, 
by prohibiting fishing on the banks of Newfoundland.' Already Lord North 
had moved, in the House of Commons [February, 1775], for an address to the 
king, affirming that Massachusetts was in a state of rebellion. The Ministers 
also endeavored to promote dissensions in America, by crippling the trade of 
New England and other colonies, but exempting New York, Delaware, and 
North Carolina. The bait of favor for these three colonies was indignantly 



' Pitt was greatly afflicted with the gout. Sometimes he was confined to his house for weeks 
by it ; and he was sometimes seen on the floor of Parliament leaning upon crutches, and his legs 
swathed in flannels. In this condition he made two of his most eloquent speeches in favor of the 
Americans. 

"" At that time, there were employed bv the Amerieans. in the British Ne-n'foundland fisheries, 
four hundred ships, two thousand fisliin^ shallops, and twenty thousand men. On account of this 
blow to the fishing trade, a sreat many inliabitants of Nantucket and ^^cinity, chiefly Quakers, went 
to North Carolina; and in Oran<re and nnilP>'-d onunties. became planters. Their descendants ara 
yet numerous there. The principal meeting-house is at New Garden. 



232 THE REVOLUTION. [1715. 

spurned — the scheme of disunion signally failed. Common dangers and com- 
mon interests drew the ligaments of fraternity closer than ever. When the 
trees budded, and the flowers bloomed in the spring of 1775, all hope of recon- 
ciliation had vanished. It was evident that 

" King, Commons, and Lords, were uniting amain," 

to destroy the Liberty Tree, planted by faithful hands. The people of the col- 
onies, though weak in military resources, were strong in purpose ; and, relying 
upon the justice of their cause, and the assistance of the Lord God Omnipotent, 
they resolved to defy the fleets and armies of Great Britain. 

There was great moral sublimity in the rising of the colonies against the 
parent country ; for it was material weakness arrayed against great material 
strength. There were more than three thousand British troops in Boston, on the 
first of April, 1775. Confident in his poAver, Gage felt certain that he could 
repress insurrections, and keep the people quiet. Yet he felt uneasy concerning 
the gathering of ammunition and stores,^ by the patriots, at Concord, sixteen miles 
from Boston. Toward midnight, on the 18th [April], he secretly dispatched 
eight hundred men, under lieutenant-colonel Smith and Major Pitcairn, to 
destroy them. So carefully had he arranged the expedition, that he believed 
it to be entirely unknown to the patriots. All his precautions were vain. The 
vigilant Dr. Warren," who was secretly watching all the movements of Gage, 
became aware of 4he expedition early in the evening ; and when it moved, 
Paul Revere,' one of the most active of the Sons of Liberty in Boston, had 
landed at Charlestown, and was on his way to Concord to arouse the inhabitants 
and minute-men. Soon afterward, church-bells, muskets, and cannons spread 
the alarm over the country ; and when, at dawn, on the 19tli of April. 1775 — 
a day memorable in the annals of our Republic — Pitcairn, with the advanced 
guard, reached Lexington, a few miles from Concord, he found seventy deter- 
mined men drawn up to oppose him. Pitcairn rode forward and shouted, 
"Disperse! disperse, you rebels! Down with your arms, and disperse!" 
They refused obedience, and he ordered his men to fire. That dreadful order 
was obeyed, and the first elood of the Revolution flowed upon the tender 
grass on the Green at Lexington. Eight citizens were killed, several were 
wounded, and the remainder were dispersed. The last survivor of that noble 
band^ died in March, 1854, at the age of almost ninety-six years. 



' Early in the year, secret orders had been sent by the ministry to the royal governors, to 
remove all ammunition and stores out of the reach of the people, if they made any hostile demon- 
strations. 

" Afterward killed in the battle op. Breed's HilL See page 235. 

' Revere was an engraver, and previous to this time had executed some creditable specimens 
of his art. He engraved a picture of the naval investment of Boston, in 1768, and of the Boston 
Massacre, in 1770. As a Grand Master of the Masonic order, he was very influential; yet, like 
those of Isaac Sears, of New York, his eminent services in the cause of freedom have been over- 
looked. Their fame is eclipsed by men of greater minds, but of no sturdier patriotism. 

* Jonathan Harrington, who played tlio fife for the minute-men. on the morning of the battle. 
The writer visited him in 1848, when he was ninety years of age. He then had a perfect recollec- 
tion of the events of that morning. A portrait of him, as he appeared at that time, is published ia. 
Lossing's Pictorial Field Book of the Revolution, page 554, vol. i. 



1775.] FIRST YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 233 

Confident of full success, the British now pressed forward to Concord, and 
destroyed the stores. They were terribly annoyed by the minute-men on their 
way, who fired upon them from behind walls, trees, and buildings. Having accom- 
plished their purpose, and killed several more patriots in a skirmish there, the 
royal troops hastily retreated to Lexington. The country was now thoroughly 
aroused, and minute-men were gathering by scores. Kothing but the timely 
arrival of Lord Percy with reinforcements,' saved the eight hundred men from 
total destruction. The whole body now retreated. All the way back to 
Bunker's Hill,' in Charlestown, the troops were terribly assailed by the patri- 
ots ; and when, the following morning, they crossed over to Boston, they ascer- 
tained their loss to be, in killed and wounded, two hundred and seventy-three. 
The loss of the Americans in killed, wounded, and missing, was one hundred 
and three.' 

The initial blow for freedom had now been struck. It was appalling to 
friend and foe. The news of this tragedy spread over the country like a blaze 
of lightning from a midnight cloud, and like the attendant thunder-peal, it 
aroused all hearts. From the hills and valleys of New England, the patriots 
went forth by hundreds, armed and unarmed; and before the close of the 
month [April 1775], an army of twenty thousand men Avere forming camps and 
piling fortifications around Boston, from Roxbury to the river Mystic, deter- 
mined to confine the fierce tiger of war, which had tasted their blood, upon that 
little peninsula. The provincial Congress,* sitting at Watertown, with Dr. 
Warren at its head, worked day and night in consonance with the gathering 
army. They appointed military officers, organized a commissariat for supplies, 
issued bills of credit for the payment of troops (for which the province was 
pledged), to the amount oi' three hundred and seventy-fi\*e thousand dollars, 
and declared [May 5] General Gage to be an "inveterate enemy " of the peo- 
ple. And as the intelligence went from colony to colony, tlie people in each 
were equally aroused. Arms and ainmnnition were seized by the Sons of 
Liberty^ provincial Congresses were formed, and before the close of summer, 
the power of every royal governor, from Massachnsetts to Georgia, Avas 
utterly destroyed. Everywhere the inhabitants armid in defense of their 
liberties, and took vigorous measures for future security. 

Some aggressive enterprises were undertaken by volunteers. The most 
important of these was the seizure of the strong fortresses of Ticonderoga^ and 
Crown Point,' on Lake Champlain, chiefly by Connecticut and Vermont 

' Earl Percy was a son of the Duke of Northumberland. When he was marching out of Bos- 
ton, his band struck up the tune of Yankee Doodle, in derision. He saw a boy at Roxbury making 
himself very merry as he passed. Percy inquired why he was so merry. "To think," said the lad, 
" how you will dance by-and-by to Ghtvy ChwseP Percy was often much influenced by presenti- 
ments, and the words of the boy made him moody. JPercy was a lineal descendant of the Earl 
Percy who was slaui in the battle of Chtvy Chase, and he felt all day as if some great calamity 
might beflill him. ^ Page 235. 

' Appropriate monuments have been erected to the memory of the slain, at Lexington, Concord, 
and Acton. Davis, the commander of the militia at Concord, was from Acton, and so were most 
of his men. The estimated value of the property destroyed by the invaders, was as follows: la 
Concord", one thousand three hundred and seventy-five dollars ; in Lexington, eight thousand three 
hundred and five dollars; in Cambridge, six thousand and ten dollars. ■• Page 230. 

* Page 196. * Page 200. 



234 THE REVOLUTION. [1775; 

militia, under the command of Colonels Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold. 
Ticonderoga and its garrison were taken possession of at dawn, on the 10th of 
May, 1775 ;' and two days afterward, Colonel Seth Warner, of the expedition, 
with a few men, captured Crown Point. The spoils of victory taken at these 
two posts, consisting of almost one hundred and fifty pieces of cannon, and a 
large quantity of ammunition and stores, were of vast consequence to the Amer- 
icans. A few months later [Mai'ch, 1776], some of these cannons were hurling^ 
death-shots into the midst of the British troops in Boston." 

Having repudiated royal authority, the people of Massachusetts were obe- 
dient to their chosen rulers, and efficient civil government was duly inaugur- 
ated. On the 19th of May [1775J, the provincial Congress of Massachusetts 
clothed the Committee of Safety, sitting at Cambridge, with full powers to 
regulate the operations of the army. Artemas Ward was appointed commander- 
in-chief, Richard Gridley,^ chief engineer, and Israel Putnam, John Stark, and 
other veterans, who had served bravely in the French and Indian war, were 
appointed to important commands. The military genius developed in that old 
conflict, was now brought into requisition. Day by day the position of the 
British army became more perilous. Fortunately for its safety, large reinforce- 
ments, under those three experienced commanders, Generals Howe, Clinton, 
and Burgoyne, arrived on the 25th of May. It was timely : and then the 
whole British force in Boston amounted to about twelve thousand men, besides 
several well-manned vessels of war, under Admiral Graves. Gage now resolved 
to attack the Americans and penetrate the country. 

Preparatory to an invasion of the province. Gage issued a proclamation 
[June 10, 1775], declaring all Americans inarms to be rebels and traitors, and 
ofiering a free pardon to all who should return to their allegiance, except those 
arch-offenders, John Hancock and Samuel Adams.* These he intended to 
seize and send to England to be hanged. The vigilant patriots, aware of Gage's- 
hostile intentions, strengthened their intrenchments on Boston Neck,^ and oa 
the evening of the 16th of June, General Ward sent Colonel Prescott° with a 
detachment of one thousand men, to take possession of, and fortify. Bunker's 
Hill, in Charlestown, which commanded an important part of Boston and the 
surrounding water. By mistake they ascended Breed's Hill, within cannon 
shot of the city, and laboring with pick and spade all that night, they had cast 
up a strong redoubt'^ of earth, on the summit of that eminence, before the Brit- 

' Allen was in chief command. Having^ taken possession of the fort and garrison by surprise,, 
he ascended to the door of the commandant's apartment, and awoke Captain De La Place, by heavy 
blows with the hilt of his sword. The astonished commander, followed by his wife, came to the 
door. He knew Allen. "What do you want?" he inquired. " I want you to surrender this fort," 
Allen answered. "By what authority do you demand it?" asked De La Place. "By the Great 
Jehovah and the Continental Congress!" said Allen, with the voice of a Stentor. The captain sub- 
mitted, and the fortress became a possession of the patriots. ' Page 247. 

» Note 1, page 138. * Note 1. page 22L ° Note .3, page 229. 

" "William Prescott was born at Groton, JSfassachusetta, in 1726. He was at Louisburg [pag* 
137] in 1745. After the battle of Bimker's Hill, he served under Gates, until the surrender of 
Burgoyne, when he left the army. He died in 1795. 

' A redoubt is a small fortification generally composed of earth, and having very few feature* 
of a regular fort, except its arrangement for the use of cannons and muskets. They are often tern* 



ITTS.] 



FIRST TEAR OF THE "WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



235 



ish were aware of their presence. Gage and liis officers were greatlj astonished 
at the apparition of this military work, at the dawn of the ITth. 

The British generals were not only astonished, but alarmed, and at once 
perceived the necessity for driving the Americans from this commanding 
position, before they should plant a heavy battery there, for in that event, 
Boston must be evacuated before sunrise. The drums beat 
to arms, and soon the city was in a great tumult. The im- 
minent danger converted many Tories into professedly 
warm Whigs, for the days of British rule appeared to be 
closing. Every eminence and roof in Boston 
swarmed with people 
[June 17, 1775], a 
heavy cannonade was 
opened upon the re- 
doubt, from a battery 
on Copp's Hill, in 
Boston,' and from the 
shipping in the har- 
bor, but with very 
little effect. Hour 
after hour the patriots 
toiled on in the com- 
pletion of their work, 
and at noon-day, theii 
task Avas finished, and they laid aside their implements of labor for knapsacks 
and muskets. General Howe, with General Pigot, and three thousand men, 
crossed the Charles River at the same time, to Morton's Point, at the foot of 
the eastern slope of Breed's Hill, formed his troops into two columns, and 
inarched slowly to attack the redoubt. Although the British commenced firing 
cannons soon after they began to ascend the hill, and the great guns of the 
ships, and the battery on Copp's Hill, poured an incQSsant storm upon the 
redoubt, the Americans kept perfect silence until they had approached within 
close musket shot. Hardly an American could be seen by the slowly approach- 
ing enemy, yet behind those rude mounds of earth, lay fifteen hundred deter- 
mined men,^ ready to pour deadly volleys of musket-balls upon the foe, when 
their commanders should order them. 




PLAN OF bunker's HILL BATTLE. 



MONUMENT. 



porary structures, cast up in the progress of a siege, or a protracted battle. The diagram A, on tho 
map, shows the form of the redoubt, a is the entrance. 

' That portion of Copp's Hill, where the British battery was constructed, is a burial-grouiul, in 
which lie many of the earher residents of that city. Among them, the Mather family, distmguished 
in the early history of the Commonwealth. See page 133. 

^ During the forenoon. General Putnam had been busy in forwarding reinforcements for Pres- 
cott, and when the battle began, about five hundred had been added to the detachment. Yet he 
found it difficult to urge many of the raw recruits forward ; and after the war, he felt it necessary tn 
arise in the church of which lie was a member, and in the presence of the congregation, acknowl- 
edge the sin of swearing on that occasion. He- partially justified himself by saying, "It was almost 
enough to make an angel swear, to see the cowards refuse to secure a victory so nearly won." 



236 THE REVOLUTION. [1775. 

It was noAV three o'clock in the afternoon. When the British column was 
within ten rods of the redoubt, Prescott shouted Fire ! and instantly whole 
platoons of the assailants were prostrated by well-aimed bullets.' The survivors 
fell back in great confusion, but were soon rallied for a second attack. They 
were ao-ain repulsed, with heavy loss, and while scattering in all directions, 
General Clinton arrived with a few followers, and joined Howe, as a volunteer. 
The fugitives were again rallied, and they rushed up to the redoubt in the face 
of a galling fire. For ten minutes the battle raged fearfully, and, in the mean 
while, CharlestoAvn, at the foot of the eminence, having been fired by a carcass" 
from Copp's Hill,^ sent up dense columns of smoke, which completely enveloped 
the belligerents. The firing in the redoubt soon grew weaker, for the ammu- 
nition of the Americans had become exhausted. It ceased altogether, and then 
the British scaled the bank and compelled the Americans to retreat, while they 
fought fiercely with clubbed muskets." Overpowered, they fled across Charles- 
town Neck,^ gallantly covered by Putnam and a few brave men, and under that 
commander, they took position on Prospect Hill, and fortified it. The British 
took possession of Bunker's Hill,* and erected a fortification there. There was 
absolutely no victory in the case. Completely exhausted, both parties sought 
rest, and hostilities ceased for a time. The Americans had lost, in killed, 
wounded, and prisoners, about four hundred and fifty men. The loss of the 
British from like causes, was almost eleven hundred.' This was the first real 
battle^ of the Revolution, and lasted almost two hours. 

Terrible for the people of Boston and vicinity, were the events of that bright 
and cloudless, and truly beautiful June day. All the morning, as we have 
observed, and during the fierce conflict, roofs, steeples, and every high place, in 
and around the city, were filled with anxious spectators. Almost every family 
had a representative among the combatants ; and in an agony of suspense, 
mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters, gazed upon the scene. Many a loved 



* Prescott ordered his men to aim at the waistbands of the British, and to piclc off their officers, 
whose fine clothes would distinguish them. It is said that men, at the first onset in battle, always 
fire too high, hence the order to aim at the waistbands. 

* A carcass is a hollow case, formed of ribs of iron covered with cloth or metal, with holes in it. 
Being filled with combustibles and set on fire, it is thrown from a mortar, Hke a bomb-shell, upon 
the roofs of buildings, and ignites them. A bomb-shell is a hollow ball with an orifice, filled with 
powder (sometimes mixed with slugs of iron), which is ignited by a slow match when fired, explodes, 
and its fragments produce terrible destruction. ' See map on page 235. 

* Most of the American muskets were destitute of bayonets, and they used the large end as 
clubs. This is a last resort. 

' Charlestown, like Boston, is on a peninsula, almost surrounded by water and a marsh. The 
Neck was a narrow causeway, connecting it with the main. Charlestown was a flourishing rival of 
Boston, at the time of the battle. It was then completely destroyed. Six hundred buildings per- 
ished in the flames. Burgoyne, speaking of the battle and conflagration, said, it was the most awfial 
and sublime sight he had ever witnessed. 

* As the battle took place on Breed's, and not on Bunker^s Hill, the former name should 
have been given to it ; but the name of Bunker's Hill has become too sacred in the records of patriot- 
ism to be changed. 

' The provincial Congress estimated the loss at about fifleen hundred ; General Gage reported 
one thousand and fifty-four. Of tlie Americans, only one hundred and fifteen were killed ; the 
remainder were wounded or made prisoners. 

" A hattle is a conflict carried on by large bodies of troops, according to the rules of military 
tactics ; a skirmish is a sudden and irregular fight between a few troops. 




1775.] FIRST TEAK OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 23T 

one perished ; and there the country lost one of its most promising children,, 
and freedom a devoted champion. Dr. Warren, who 
had just been appointed major-general, had crossed 
Charlestown Neck in the midst of flying balls from the 
British shipping, and reached the redoubt on Breed's 
Hill, at the moment when the enemy scaled its banks. 
He was killed by a musket ball, while retreating. 
Buried where he fell, near the redoubt, the tall Bunker 
Hill monument of to-day, standing on that spot, com- 
memorates his death, as well as the patriotism of his 
countrymen. ^ ^^^^^,^^ ^^.^^^^^,._ 

The storm was not confined to the east. While 
these events were occurring in New England, the Revolution was making rapid 
progress elsewhere. Even before the tragedy at Lexington and Concord, 
Patrick Henry^ had again aroused his countrymen by his eloquence, and in the 
Virginia Assembly, convened at Richmond, on the 23d of March, 1775, he 
concluded a masterly speech with that noted sentiment, which became the war- 
cry of the patriots, " Give me Liberty, or give me Death !" When, 
twenty-six days later [April 20], Governor Dunmore, by ministerial command,* 
seized and conveyed on board a British vessel of war, a quantity of gunpowder 
belonging to the colony, that same inflexible patriot went at the head of armed 
citizens, and demanded and received from the royal representative, full restitu- 
tion. And before the battle of Bunker's Hill, the exasperated people had 
driven Dunmore^ from his palace at Williamsburg [June], and he was a refugee, 
shorn of political power, on board a British man-of-war in the York River. 

Further south, still bolder steps had been taken. The people in the inte- 
rior of North Carolina, where the Regulator ISIovement occurred four years 
earlier, asserted their dignity and their rights as freemen, in a way that aston- 
ished even the most sanguine and determined patriots elsewhere. A convention 
of delegates chosen by the people, assembled at Charlotte, in Mecklenberg 
county, in May, 1775, and by a series of resolutions, they virtually declared 
their constituents absolved from all allegiance to the British crown," organized 
local government, and made provisions for military defense. In South Carolina 
and Georgia, also, arms and ammunition had been seized by the people, and 
all royal authority was repudiated. 

While the whole country was excited by the rising rebellion, and on the 

' Joseph "Warren was born in Roxbury, in 1740. He was at the head of his profession as a 
physician, when the events of the approaching revolution brought him into public life. He was 
thirty-five years of age when he died. His remains rest in St. Paul's church, in Boston. 

* Note 1, page 214. ^ Note 1, page 232. 

* Dunmore was strongly suspected of a desire to have the hostile Indians west of the Allegha- 
nies annihilate the Virginia troops sent against them in the summer of 1774 They suffered ter- 
rible loss in a battle at Point Pleasant on the Ohio, in October of that year, in consequence of the 
failure of promised aid fi'om Dunmore. They subdued the Indians, however. 

* This "Declaration of Independence," as it is called, was made about thirteen months previous 
to the general Declaration put forth by the Continental Congress, and is one of the glories of the 
people of North Carolina. It consisted of a series of twenty resolutions, and was read, from time to 
time, to other gatherings of the people, after the convention at Charlotte. 



23;^ THE REVOLUTION. [177B. 

very day [May 10] when Allen and Arnold took Ticonderoga, ' the Second 
Continental Congress convened at Philadelphia. Notwithstanding New 
England was in a blaze of war, royal authority had virtually ceased in all the 
colonies, and the conflict for independence had actually begun," that august 
body held out to Great Britain a loyal, open hand of reconciliation. Congress 
sent [July, 1775J a most loyal petition to the king, and conciliatory addresses 
to the people of Great Britain. At the same time they said firmly, ' ' We have 
counted the cost of this contest, and find nothing so dreadful as voluntary 
slavery." They did not foolishly lose present advantages in waiting for a reply, 
but pressed forward in the work of public security. Having resolved on armed 
resistance, they voted to raise an army of twenty thousand men ; and two days 
before the battle of Bunker's Hill [June 15, 1775], they elected George 
IVashington commander-in-chief of all the forces raised, or to be raised, for 
the defense of the colonies.^ That destined Father of his Country, was then 
forty-three years of age. They also adopted the incongruous mass of undis- 
ciplined troops at Boston,^ as a Continental Army, and appointed general 
officers' to assist Washington in its organization and future operations. 

General Washington took command of the army at Cambridge, on the 3d 
of July, and with the efficient aid of General Gates, who was doubtless the best 
disciplined soldier then in the field, order was soon brought out of great con- 
fusion, and the Americans were prepared to commence a regular siege of the 
British army in Boston.' To the capture or expulsion of those troops, the 
efibrts of Washington were mainly directed during the summer and autumn of 
1775. Fortifications were built, a thorough organization of the army was 
effected, and all that industry and skill could do, with such material, in perfect- 
ing arrangements for a strong and fatal blow, was accomplished. The army, 



' Page 234. " Page 232. 

^ Washington -was a delegate in Congress from Virginia, and his appointment was wholly unex- 
pected to him. When the time came to choose a commander-in-chief, John Adams arose, and after 
a brief speech, in which he delineated the qualities of the man whom he thought best titted for the 
important service, he expressed his intenton to propose a member from Virginia for the office of 
generalissimo. All present understood the allusion, and the next day, Thomas Johnson, of Mary- 
land, nominated Colonel Washington, and he was, by unanimous vote, elected commander-in-chief 
At the same time Congress resolved that they would " maintain and assist him, and adhere to him, 
with their lives and fortunes, in the cause of American liberty." When President Hancock 
announced to Washington his appointment, he modestly, and with great dignity, signified his accept- 
ance in the following terms: " Mr. President — Though I am truly sensible of the high honor done 
me, in this appointment, yet I feel great distress, from a consciousness that my abilities and military 
experience may not be equal to the extensive and important trust. However, as the Congress 
desire it, I will enter upon the momentous duty, and exert every power I possess in their service, 
find for the support of the glorious cause. I beg they will accept my most cordial thanks for this 
distinguished testimony of their approbation. But lest some unlucky event should happen, unfavor- 
able to my reputation, I beg it may be remembered by every gentleman in this room, that I, this 
day, declare with the utmost sincerity, I do not think myself equal to the command I am honored 
with. As to pay, sir, I beg leave to assure the Congress that, as no pecuniary consideration could 
have tempted me to accept the arduous employment, at the expense of my domestic ease and hap- 
piness, I do not wish to make any profit from it. I will keep an exact account of my expenses. 
Those, I doubt not, they will discliarge, and that is all I desire." ■• Page 232. 

° Artemas Ward, Charles Lee, Philip Schuyler, and Israel Putnam, were appointed major- 
generals; Horatio Gates, adjutant-general; and Seth Pomeroy, Richard Montgomery, David Wooster, 
William Heath, Joseph Spencer, John Thomas, John Sullivan, and Nathaniel Green (aU New 
England men), brigadier-generals. ® Page 232. 



1775.] 



FIRST YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



239 



fourteen thousand strong at the close of the year, extended from Roxbarj on 
the right, to Prospect Hill, two miles north-west of Breeds Hill, on the left. 
The right was commanded by General Ward, the left by General Lee. The 
centre, at Cambridge, was under the immediate control of the commander-in- 
chief. 




At the close of May, Congress sent an affectionate address to the people of 
Canada. They were cordially invited to join their Anglo-American' neighbors' 
in eflForts to obtain redress of grievances, but having very little sympathy in 
language, religion, or social condition with them, they refused, and were neces- 
sarily considered positive supporters of the royal cause. The capture of the 
two fortresses on Lake Champlain^ [^^aj? 1775], having opened the way to the 
St. Lawrence, a well-devised plan to take possession of that province and pre- 
vent its becoming a place of rendezvous and supply of invading armies from 
Great Britain, was matured by Congress and the commander-in-chief.* To 



* Note 1, page 193. 

' The Congress of 1774, made an appeal To the inhabitants of Quebec, in which was clearly set 
forth the grievances of the colonists, and an invitation to fraternize with those already in union. 

* Page 234. 

* A committee of Congress, consisting of Dr. Franklin, Thomas Lynch, and Benjamin Harrison, 
•went to Cambridge, in August, and there the plan of the campaign agauast Canada was arranged. 



240 THE RE\rOLUTION. [1775; 

accomplish this, a body of New York and New England troops were placed 
under the command of Generals Schuyler' and Montgomery," and ordered to 
proceed by way of Lake Champlain to Montreal and Quebec. 

Had Congress listened to the earnest advice of Colonel Ethan Allen, to 
invade Canada immediately after the capture of Ticonderoga and Crown Point, 
the result of the expedition would doubtless have been very different, for at that 
time the British forces in the province were few, and they had made no prepar- 
ations for hostilities. It was near the close of August before the invading army 
appeared before St. John on the Sorel, the first military post within the Cana- 
dian line. Deceived in regard to the strength of the garrison and the dispo- 
sition of the Canadians and the neighboring Indians, Schuyler fell back 
to Isle Aux Noix,^ and after making preparations to fortify it, he hastened to 
Ticonderoga to urge forward more troops. Sickness compelled him to return 
to Albany, and the whole command devolved upon Montgomery, his second in 
command. That energetic ofl&cer did not remain long within his island intrench- 
ments, and toward the close of September, he laid siege to St. John. The gar- 
rison maintained an obstinate resistance for more than a month, and Montgomery 
twice resolved to abandon it. During the siege, small detachments of brave 
men went out upon daring enterprises. One, of eighty men, under Colonel 
Ethan Allen,* pushed across the St. Lawrence, and attacked Montreal [Sep- 
tember 25, 1775], then garrisoned by quite a strong force under General 
Prescott.^ This was done at the suggestion of Colonel John Brown, who was 
to cross the river with his party, a little above, and co-operate with Allen. He 
failed to do so, and disaster ensued. Allen and his party were defeated, and 
he was made prisoner and, with several of his men, was sent to England in irons. 
Another expedition under Colonel Bedell, of New Hampshire, was more suc- 
cessful. They captured the strong fort (but feeble garrison) at Chambly 
[October 30], a few miles north of St. John; and at about the same time, Sir 
Guy Carleton, governor of Canada, with a reinforcement for the garrison of St. 
John, was repulsed [November 1] by a party under Colonel Warner, at 
Longueil, nearly opposite Montreal. These events alarmed Preston, the com- 
mander of St. John, and he surrendered that post to Montgomery, on the 3d of 
November. 

When the victory was complete, the Americans pressed on toward Mont- 



' Philip Schuyler was bom at Albany, New Tork, in 1733, and was one of the wisest and best 
men of his time. He was a captain under Sir William Johnson [page 190] in 1755, and was active 
in the public service, chiefly in civil affairs, from that time until the Revolution. During that 
struggle, he was very prominent, and after the war, was almost continually engaged in public life, 
until his death, which occurred in 1804. 

^ Richard Montgomery was born in Ireland, in 1737. He was with Wolfe, at Quebec [page 
201], and afterward married a sister of Chancellor Livingston, and settled in the State of New York. 
He gave promise of great military ability, when death ended his career. See portrait on page 242. 

* Note 8, pao,. 197. 

* Ethan Allen was bom in Litchfield county, Connecticut. He went to Vermont at an early 
age, and in 1770 was one of the bold leaders there in the opposition of the settlers to the territorial 
claims of New York. He was never engaged in active military services after his capture. He died 
in Vermont in February, 1789, and his remains lie in a cemetery two miles from Burlington, near 
the WinooskL * Page 271. 



1775.] FIRST YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 241 

real. Governor Carleton, conscious of his weakness, immediately retreated on 
board one of the vessels of a small fleet lying in the river, and escaped to Que- 
bec; and on the following day [November 13], Montgomery entered the city 
in triumph. He treated the people humanely, gained their respect, and with 
the woolen clothing found among the spoils, he commenced preparing his sol- 
diers for the rigors of a Canadian winter. There was no time to be lost, by 
delays. Although all their important posts in Canada were in possession of the 
patriots, yet, Montgomery truly said, in a letter to Congress, " till Quebec is 
taken, Canada is unconquered." Impressed with this idea, he determined to 
push forward to the capital, notwithstanding the inclemency of the weather and 
the desertion of his troops. Winter frosts were binding the waters, and blind- 
ing snow was mantling the whole country. 

The spectacle presented by this little army, in the midst of discouragements 
of every kind, was one of great moral grandeur. Yet it was not alone at that 
perilous hour ; for while this expedition, so feeble in number and supplies, was 
on its way to achieve a great purpose, another, consisting of a thousand men, 
under Colonel Benedict Arnold,' had left Cambridge [Sept., 1775], and was 
making its way through the deep wilderness by the Kennebec and Chaudiere* 
Rivers, to join Montgomery before the walls of Quebec. That expedition was 
one of the most wonderful on record. For thirty-two days they traversed a 
gloomy wilderness, without meeting a human being. Frost and snow were 
upon the ground, and ice was upon the surface of the marshes and the streams, 
which they were compelled to traverse and ford, sometimes arm-pit deep in 
water and mud. Yet they murmured not ; and even women followed in their 
train.® After enduring incredible toils and hardships, exposed to intense cold 
and biting hunger, they arrived at Point Levi,* opposite Quebec, on the 9th of 
November. Four days afterward [Nov. 13], and at about the same time when 
Montgomery entered Montreal, the intrepid Arnold, with only seven hundred 
and fifty half-naked men, not more than four hundred muskets, and no artil- 
lery, crossed the St. Lawrence to Wolfe's Cove,^ ascended to the Plains of 
Abraham," and boldly demanded a surrender of the city and garrison within the 
massive walls. Soon the icy winds, and intelligence of an intended sortie^ from 
the garrison, drove Arnold from his bleak encampment, and he ascended the 
St. Lawrence to Point au Trembles, twenty miles above Quebec, and there 



^ Page 234. " Pronounced Sko-de-are. 

' Judge Henry, of Pennsylvania, then a young man, accompanied the expedition. He wrote 
an account of the siege of Quebec, and in it he mentions the wives of Sergeant Grier and of a pri- 
vate soldier, who accompanied them. "Entering the ponds," he says, "and breal^ing the ice here 
and tliere with the butts of our guns, and our feet, we were soon waist-deep in mud and water. As 
is generally the case with youths, it came to my mind that a better path might be found than that 
of tlie more elderly guide. Attempting this, the water in a trice cooUng my arm-pits, made me 
gladly return in the file. Now, Mrs. Grier had got before me. My mind was humbled, yet aston- 
ished, at the exertions of this good woman." Like the soldiers, she waded through the deep waters 
and the mud. 

* Page 201, Several men who were afterward prominent actors in the Revolution, accompanied 
Arnold in this expedition. Among them, also, was Aaron Burr, then a youth of twenty, who was 
afterward Vice-President of the United States. ^ Page 202. " Page 202. 

' This is a French term, significant of a sudden saUy of troops fi:om a besieged city or fortress 
to attack the besiegers. See page 434. 

16 



242 



THE REVOLUTION-. 



[I'lTS. 



awaited the arrival of Montgomerj. These brave generals met on the 1st of 
December [1775], and woolen clothes whicli Montgomerj brought from Mont- 
real, were placed on the shivering limbs of Arnold's troops. The united forces, 
about nine hundred strong, then marched to Quebec. 

It was on the evening of the 5th of December when the Americans reached 
Quebec, and the next morning early, Montgomerj sent a letter to Carleton, by 
a flag,' demanding an immediate surrender. The flag was fired upon, and the 
invaders were defied. With a few light cannons and some mortars, and ex- 
posed to almost dailj snow-storms in the open fields, the Americans besieged 
the city for three weeks. Success appearing only in assault, that measure was 
agreed upon, and before dawn, on the morning of the last 
day 'S the year [Dec. 31, 1775], while snow was falling 
thickly, the attempt was made. Montgomery had formed 
his little army into four columns, to assail the city at difier- 
ent points. One of these, under Arnold, was to attack the 
lower town, and march along the St. Charles to join another 
division, under Montgomery, who was to approach by way 
of Cape Diamond,'' and the two were to attempt a forced pass- 
age into the city, through Prescott Gate.' At the same 
time, the other two columns, under Majors Livingston and 
Brown, were to make a feigned attack upon t^e uppe own, from the Plains 
of Abraham. In accordance with this plan, Montgom /y descended Wolfe's 
Ravine, and marched carefully along the ice-strewn beach, toward a pallisade 
and battery at Cape Diamond. At the head of his men, in the face of the 
driving snow, he had passed the pallisade unopposed, 
when a single discharge of a cannon from the battery, 
loaded with grape-shot,^ killed him instantly, and slew 
several of his ofiicers, among whom were his two aids, 
McPherson and Cheeseman. His followers instantly re- 
treated. In the mean while, Arnold had been severely 
wounded, while attacking a barrier on the St. Charles,^ 
and the command of his division devolved upon Captain 
Morgan,® whose expert riflemen, with Lamb's artillery, 
forced their Avay into the lower town. After a contest 
of several hours, the Americans, under Morgan, were obliged to surrender them- 




WALLS OP QUEBEC. 




GENERAL MONTGOMERY. 



* Mepseng:ers are sent from army to army with a white flag, indicating a desire for a peaceful 
interview. Tliese flags, by common consent, are respected, and it is considered an outrage to fire 
on the bearer of one. The Americans were regarded as rebels, and undeserving the usual courtesy. 

^ Tlie high rocky promontory on whicli the citadel stands. 

^ Prescott Gate is on the St. Lawrence side of the town, and there bars Mountain-street in its 
sinuous way from the water up into the walled city. The above diagram shows the plan of the city 
walls, and relative positions of the several gates mentioned. A is the St. Charles Eiver, B the St. 
Lawrence, a Wolfe and Montcalm's monument [page 202], b the place where Montgomery fell, c 
the place where Arnold was wounded. 

* These are small balls confined in a cluster, and then discharged at once from a cannon. They 
scatter, and do great execution. 

^ This was at the foot of the precipice, below the present grand battery, near St. Paul's-street. 
® Afterward the famous General Morgan, whose rifle corps became so renowned, and who gained 
the victory at The Cowpens, in the winter of 1781. See page 331. 



1775.] FIRST YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 243 

selves prisoners of Avar. The whole loss of the Americans, under Montgomery 
iind Arnold, in this assault, was about one hundred and sixty. The British 
loss was only about twenty killed and wounded. 

Colonel Arnold, with the remainder of the troops, retired to Sillery, where 
he formed a camp, and passed a rigorous Canadian winter. He was relieved 
from chief command by General Wooster,' on the 1st of April, who came 
-down from Montreal with reinforcements, when another ineffectual attempt 
was made to capture Quebec. When, a month afterward. General Thomas 
took the chief command [May, 1776], Carleton was receiving strong reinforce- 
ments from England, and the patriots were compelled to abandon all hope of 
■conquering Canada. They were obliged to retreat so hastily before the over- 
whelming forces of Carleton, that they left their stores and sick behind them.* 
Abandoning one post after another, the Americans were driven entirely out 
of Canada by the middle of June. 

The Virginians were rolling on the car of the Eevolution with a firm and 
steady hand, while the patriots were suffering defeats and disap})ointments at 
the North. We have already alluded to the fact, that the people of Williams- 
burg, then the capital of Virginia, had driven Lord Dunmore, the royal gov- 
ernor, away from iiis palace, to take refuge on board a ship of war.^ He was 
the first royal representative who " abdicated government," and he was greatly 
exasperated because he was compelled to do so in a very humiliating manner. 
From that vessel he sent letters, messages, and addresses to the Virginia House 
of Burgesses,^ and received the same in return. Each exhibited much spirit. 
Finally, in the autumn, the governor proceeded to Norfolk with the fleet, and, 
collecting a force of Tories and negroes, commenced depredations in lower Vir- 
ginia. With the aid of some British vessels, he attacked Hampton, near Old 
Point Comfort,^ on the 24tli of October, and was repulsed. He then declared 
open war. The Virginia militia flew to arms, and in a severe battle, fought on 
the 9th of December, at the Great Bridge, near the Dismal Swamp, twelve 
miles from Norfolk, Dunmore was defeated, and compelled to seek safety with 
the British shipping in Norfolk harbor. In that battle, the regiment of men, 
chiefly from Culpepper county, raised by Patrick Henry, and at the head of 
whom he demanded payment for the powder removed from Williamsburg,^ did 
very important service.' 

' Page 270. 

^ General Thomas was seized with the small-pox, which had been raging some time in the 
American camp, and died at Chambly on the 30th of Mar. He was a native of Plymouth, Mass., 
and was one of tlio tirst eight brigadiers appointed by Congress [note 5, page 23S]. Carleton 
treated the prisoners and sick with great humanity. He afterward, on the death of his father, be- 
came Lord Dorchester. He died in 1808, aged eighty -three years. 

s Page 237. " Page 71. ^ Page 64. " Page 237. 

^ This regiment had adopted a flag with the significant device of a coiled 
rattle-snake, seen in the engraving. This device was upon many flags in the 
army and navy of the Revolution. The expression, "Don't tread on me," 
had a double signification. It might be said in a supplicating tone, " Don't 
tread on me ; " or menacingly, " Don't tread on vie." The soldiers were 
dressed in green hunting-shirts, with Henry's words. Liberty ok Death 
[page 237], in large white letters on their bosoms. They had bucks' tails 
in their huts, and in their belts tomahawks and scalpmg-knives. Their 
fi'vco appearance alarmed the peojile, as they mai'ched through the countiy. 




CULPEPPER FLAG. 



244 THE REVOLUTION. [1776. 

Five days af.er the battle at the Great Bridge, the Virginians, under 
Colonel Woodford, entered Norfolk in triumph [Dec. 14, 1775], and the next 
morning they were joined by Colonel Robert Howe,' with a North Carolina 
regiment, when the latter assumed the general command. Dunmore was greatly 
exasperated by these reverses, and, in revenge, he caused Norfolk to be burned 
early on the morning of the 1st of January, 1776. The conflagration raged 
for fifty hours, and while the wretched people were witnessing the destruction 
of their property, the modern Nero caused a cannonade to be kept up." When 
the destruction was complete, he proceeded to play the part of a marauder along 
the defenseless coast of Virginia. For a time he made his head quarters upon 
Gwyn's island, in Chesapeake Bay, near the mouth of the Piankatank River, 
from which he was driven, with his fleet, by a brigade of Virginia troops under 
General Andrew Lewis. ^ After committing other depredations, he went to the 
West Indies, carrying with him about a thousand negroes which he had col- 
lected during his marauding campaign, where he sold them, and in the follow- 
ing autumn returned to England. These atrocities kindled an intense flame 
of hatred to royal rule throughout the whole South, and a desire for political 
independence of Great Britain budded spontaneously in a thousand hearts- 
where, a few months before, the plant of true loyalty was blooming. 



CHAPTER III. 

SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. [1776.] 

There was great anxiety in the public mind throughout the colonies at the- 
opening of the year 1776. The events of the few preceding months appeared 
unpropitious for the republican cause, and many good and true men were dis- 
posed to pause and consider, before going another step in the path of rebellion. 
But the bolder leaders in the senate and in the camp were undismayed ; and 
the hopeful mind of Washington, in the midst of the most appalling discourage- 
ments, faltered not for a moment. He found himself strong enough to be the 
efiectual jailor of the British army in Boston, and now he was almost prepared 
to commence those blows which finally drove that army and its Tory abettors to 
the distant shores of Nova Scotia.^ He had partially re-organized the conti- 

' Page 292. 

* "When Dunmore destroyed Norfolk, its population was six thousand ; and so rapidly was it 
increasing in business and wealth, that in two years, from 1773 to 1775, the rents in the city in- 
creased from forty thousand to fifty thousand dollars a year. The actual loss by the cannonade and 
conflagration was estimated at fifteen hundred thousand dollars. The personal suffering was incon- 



^ General Lewis was a native of Virginia, and was in the battle when Braddock was killed. 
He was the commander of the Virginia troops in the battle at Point Pleasant [note 4, page 237],, 
in the summer of 1774 He left the army, on account of illness, in 1780, and died not long after- 
trard, while absent from home. * Note 2, page 80. 



l-JTS.] SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. £45 



nental forces under his command ; and on the first of January, 1776, he unfurled 

the Union Flag, for the first time, over the American camp 

at Cambridge.' His army had then dwindled to less than 

ten thousand effective men, and these were scantily fed and 

clothed, and imj^erfectly disciplined. But the camp was well 

supplied with provisions, and about ten thousand minute-men,* 

•chiefly in Massachusetts, were held in reserve, ready to march 

when called upon. 

During the summer and autumn of 1775, the Continental Congress had put 
forth all its energies in preparations for a severe struggle with British power, 
now evidently near at hand. Articles of war were agreed to on the 30th of 
June ; a declaration of the causes for taking up arms was issued on the 6th of 




UNION FLAG. 







Six 'j!J0l1d'm§. 

•nrmSBilt entitle. tK. 
„A Bcsre- to -rtr.:.,. 
MX SPANISH MILLED 
DOLLAi^S. or t"he 
Value ther«o/ inCoLD 
orS'ILVERaccoTdtne-to 

aRc^iutior. of coy= 

GRESS MIMat Phi. 
Tc(Je(pWNov2.-;77(j. 



■ a! .^ ^1 ^'^ DOLLARS 



tfyhy 



W mM^mm 



A BILL OF CREDIT, OR CONTINENTAL MONEY. 




July; and before the close of the year, bills of credit, known as "continental 
money," representing the value of six millions of Spanish dollars, had been 
A naval establishment had also been commenced;^ and at the opening 



' The hoisting of that ensign was hailed by General Howe, the British commander in Boston, with 
great joy, for he regarded it as a token that a gracious sjieech of the king on American affairs, lately 
communicated to Parhament, was well received by the army, and that submission would speedily 
follow. That flag was composed of thirteen stripes, alternate red and white, symbolizing the thir- 
teen revolted colonies. In one corner was the device of the British Union Flag, namely, the cross of 
St. George, composed of a horizontal and perpendicular bar, and the cross of St. Andrew (represent- 
ing Scotland), which is in the form of x . It was the appearance of that s^'mbol of the British 
union that misled Howe. This flag is represented in the above little sketch. On the 14th of June, 
1777, Congress ordered "thirteen stars, white, in a blue field," to be put m the place of the British, 
union device. Such is the design of our flag at the present day. A star has been added for every 
new State admitted into the Union, while the original number of stripes is retained. 

' Page 229. 

' The resolution of the Continental Congress, providing for the emission of bills, was adopted on 
the 22d of June, 1775. The bills were printed and issued soon after, and other emissions were 
authorized, from time to time, during about four years. At the beginning of 1780, Congress had 
issued two hundred millions of dollars in paper money. After the second j^ear, these bills began to 
depreciate; and in 1780, forty paper dollars were worth only one in specie. At the close of 1781, 
they were worthless. They had performed a temporary good, but were finally productive of great 
.public evil, and much individual suffering. Some of these bills are yet in existence, and are con- 
sidered great curiosities. They were rudely engraved, and printed on thick paper, which caused 
the British to call it "the paste-board money of the rebels." * Note 1, page 307. 



246 THE REVOLUTION. [1776.. 

of 1776, many expert privateersmen' were hovering along our coasts, to the 
great terror and annoyance of British merchant vessels. 

There had been, up to this time, a strange apathy concerning American 
affairs, in the British Parliament, owing, chiefly, to the confidence reposed in 
the puissance of the imperial government, and a want of knowledge relative to 
the real strength of the colonies. Events had now opened the eyes of British 
statesmen to a truer appreciation of the relative position of the contestants, and 
the importance of vigorous action ; and at the close of 1775, Parliament had 
made extensive arrangements for crushing the rebellion. An act was passed 
[Nov., 1775], which declared the revolted colonists to be rebels ; forbade all 
intercourse with them ; authorized the seizure and destruction or confiscation 
of all American vessels ; and placed the colonies under martial law.' An ag- 
gregate land and naval force of fifty-five thousand men was voted for the 
American service, and more than a million of dollars were appropriated for their 
pay and sustenance. In addition to these, seventeen thousand troops were hired 
by the British government from the Landgrave of Ilesse-Cassel, and other 
petty German rulers,^ to come hither to butcher loyal subjects who had peti- 
tioned for their rights for ten long years, and now, even with arms in their 
hands, were praying for justice, and begging for reconciliation. This last act 
filled the cup of government iniquity to the brim. It Avas denounced in Par- 
liament by the true friends of England, as "disgraceful to the British name," 
and it extinguished the last hope of reconciliation. The sword was now drawn, 
and the scabbard was thrown away. 

Intelligence of the proceedings in Parliament reached America in January, 
1776, and Congress perceived the necessity of putting forth immediate and effi- 
cient efibrts for the defense of the extensive sea-coast of the colonies. Washing- 
ton was also urged to attack the British in Boston, iipmediately ; and, by great 
efibrts, the regular army was augmented to about fourteen thousand men to- 
ward the close of February. In the mean while, the provincial Congress of 
Massachusetts organized the militia of the province anew, and ten regiments, 
making about three thousand men, arrived in camp early in February. The 
entire army now numbered about seventeen thousand efiective men, while the 
British force did not exceed five thousand fit for duty. Reinforcements were 
daily expected from Halifax, New York, and Ireland, and the present seemed 
a proper moment to strike. Bills of credit,'' representing four millions of dol- 
lars more, Avere issued ; Congress promised energetic co-operation ; and on th& 

* Private individuals, having a license from government to arm and equip a vessel, and with it 
to depredate upon tlie commerce of a nation with which that people are then at war, are called 
privateersmen, and their vessels are known as privateers. During the Revolution, a vast number 
•f English vessels were captured by American privateersmen. It is, after all, only legalized piracy, 
and enlightened nations begin to view it so. ^ Note 8, page 170. 

^ The Landgrave (or petty prince) of Hesse-Cassel, having furnished the most considerable por- 
tion of these troops, they were called by the general name of Hessians. Ignorant, brutal, and 
bloodthirsty, they were hated by the patriots, and despised even by the regular English army. Thej 
were always employed in posts of greatest danger, or in expeditions least creditable. These troop* 
cost the British government almost eight hundred thousand dollars, besides the necessity, according; 
to the contract, of defending the little principalities thus stripped, against theii foes. 

♦ Page 245 



1776.] SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 247 

Ist of March, Washington felt strong enough to attempt a clislodgment of the 
enemy from the crushed city.* 

On the evening of the 2d of March [1776J, a heavy cannonade was opened 
upon Boston, from all the American batteries, and was continued, Avith brief 
intermissions, until the 4th. On the evening of that day. General Thomas, ^ 
with twelve hundred men with intrenching tools, and a guard of eight hundred, 
proceeded secretly to a high hill, near Dorchester, on the south side of Boston, 
and before morning, they cast up a line of strong intrenchments, and planted 
heavy cannons there, which completely commanded the city and harbor. It 
was the anniversary of the memorable Boston.,Massacre,3 and many patriots felt 
the blood coursing more swiftly through their veins, as the recollection of that 
event gave birth to vengeful feelings. It had nerved their arms Avhile toiling 
all that long night, and they felt a great satisfaction in knowing that they had 
prepared works which not only greatly astonished and alarmed the British, but 
which would be instrumental in achieving a great victory. The enemy felt the 
danger, and tried to avert it. 

Perceiving the imminent peril of both fleet and army, General Howe pre- 
pared an expedition to drive the Americans from their vantage-ground on Dor- 
chester heights. A storm suddenly arose, and made the harbor impassable.* 
The delay allowed the patriots time to make their works almost impregnable, 
and the British were soon compelled to surrender as prisoners of war, or to 
evacuate the city immediately, to avoid destruction. As prisoners, they would 
have been excessively burdensome to the colonies ; so, having formally agreed 
to allow them to depart without injury, Washmgton had the inexpressible 
pleasure of saying, in a letter written to the President of Congress, on Sunday, 
the 17th of March, "that this morning the ministerial troops evacuated the 
town of Boston, without destroying it, and that we are now in full possession." 
Seven thousand soldiers, four thousand seamen, and fifteen hundred families of 
loyalists,^ sailed for Halifax on that day. 

The gates on Boston Neck were now unbarred ; and General Ward, with 
five thousand of the troops at Roxbury, entered the city, with drums beating, 
and banners waving, greeted on every side with demonstrations of joy by the 
redeemed people. General Putnam soon afterward [^March 18 j entered with 
another division, and, in command of the whole, he took possession of tae city 
and all the forts, in the name of the Thirteen United Colonies. 



' Page 226. ' Page 243. ^ Pago 221. 

* A similar event occurred to frustrate tlie designs of the British at Torktown, several years 
afterward. See page 341. 

^ It must be remembered that the Americans were by no means unanimous in their opposition 
to Great Britain. From the beginning there were many who supported the crown ; and as the 
colonists became more and more rebellious, these increased. Some because they beli''ved their 
brethren to be wrong ; others through timidity ; and a greater number because they thouglii it 
their interest to adhere to the king. The loyalists, or Tories, were the worst and most efficient en- 
emies of the Whigs [note 4, page 226] during the whole war. Those who left Boston at tliis time, 
were afraid to encounter the exasperated patriots, when they should return to their desolated homes 
in the city, from which they had been driven by military persecution. The churches iiad been 
stripped of their pulpits and pews, for fuel, fine shade trees had been burned, and many houses bad 
been pillaged and damaged by the soldiery. 




248 THE EEVOLUTION. [1776. 

Washington had been informed, early in January, 
that General Sir Henry Clinton had sailed from Bos- 
ton, with a considerable body of troops, on a secret ex- 
pedition. Apprehending that the city of New York 
was his destination, he immediately dispatched General 
Charles Lee to Connecticut to raise troops, and to pro- 
ceed to that city to watch and oppose Clinton wherever 
he might attempt to land. Six weeks before the evacu- 
ation of Boston [March 17, 1776], Lee had encamped 
near New York with twelve hundred militia. Already 

GENERAL LEE. ^ r ., 7. 

the h^ons of Liberty had been busy, and overt acts of 
rebellion had been committed by them. They had seized the cannons at Fort 
George,'^ and driven Tryon,^ the royal governor, on board the Asia, a British 
armed vessel in the harbor. In March, Clinton arrived at Sandy Hook, just 
outside New York harbor, and on the same day, the watchful Lee' providen- 
tially entered the city. The movement, although without a knowledge of Clin- 
ton's position, was timely, for it kept him at bay. Foiled in his attempt upon 
New Y'^ork, that commander sailed southward, where we shall meet him pres- 
ently. 

The destination of Howe, when he left Boston, was also unknown to Wash- 
ington. Supposing he, too, would proceed to New York, he put the main body 
of his airay in motion toward that city, as soon as he had placed Boston in a 
state of security. He arrived in New Y^ork about the middle of April [April 
14], and proceeded at once to fortify the town and vicinity, and also the passes 
of the Hudson Highlands, fifty miles above. In the mean while, General Lee, 
who had been appointed to command the American forces in the South, had 
left his troops in the charge of General Lord Stirling^ [March 7], and was 
hastening toward the Carolinas to watch the movements of Clinton, arouse the 
Whigs, and gather an army there. 

In the spring of 1776, a considerable fleet, under Admiral Sir Peter Parker, 
was sent from England, to operate against the sea-coast towns of the southern, 
colonies. Parker was joined by Clinton, at Cape Fear, in May, when the lattet 
took the chief command of all the land forces. The fleet arrived ofi" Charleston 
bar on the 4th of June, and on the same day, Clinton, with several hundred 
men, landed on Long Island, which lies eastward of Sullivan's Island. Apprised 
of these hostile designs, and elated by a victory obtained by North Carolina 
militia, under Colonel Caswell, over fifteen hundred loyalists*' [February 27, 

* Note 1, page 215. 

' This fort stood at the foot of Broadway, on a portion of the site of the present "Battery." 
' Page 223. 

* Charles Lee was born in "Wales in 1731. He wa.s a brave ofiBcer in the British army during 
the French and Indian War. He settled in Virginia in 1773, and was one of the first brigadiers of 
the Continental army appointed by Congress. His ambition and perversity of temper, finally caused 
his ruin. He died in Philadelphia in 1782. See page 288. ^ Page 254. 

* These were chiefly Scotch Highlanders, and were led by Donald McDonald, an influential 
Scotchman then residing at Cross Creek, now Fayetteville. The husband of Flora McDonald, so 
celebrated in connection with the flight of the young Pretender from Scotland, at the close of the 
jebeUion in 1745, was in the battle. Flora was then living at Cross Creek. 




1776.] SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 249 

1776], on Moore's Creek, in the present Hanover county, the southern patriots 
had cheerfully responded to the call of Governor Rutledge, and about six thou- 
sand armed men had collected in and near Charleston, 
when the enemy appeared.' The city and eligible 
posts near it, had been fortified, and quite a strong 
fort, composed of palmetto logs and sand, and armed 
with twenty-six mounted cannons, had been erected 
upon Sullivan's Island, to command the channel 
leading to the town. This fort was garrisoned by 
about five hundred men, chiefly militia, under Colo- 
nel William Moultrie.' 

A combined attack, by land and water, upon general moulteie. 

Sullivan's Island, was commenced by the British, on 

the morning of the 28th of June, 1776. While the fleet was pouring a terrible 
storm of iron balls upon Fort Sullivan, Clinton endeavored, but in vain, to 
force a passage across a narrow creek which divided the two islands, in order to 
attack the yet unfinished fortress in the rear. But Colonel Thompson, with a 
small battery on the east end of Sullivan's Island, repelled every forward 
movement of Clinton, while the cannons of the fort were spreading havoc among 
the British vessels.^ The conflict raged for almost ten hours, and only ceased 
when night fell upon the scene. Then the British fleet, almost shattered into frag- 
ments, withdrew, and abandoned the enterprise." The slaughter of the British 
had been frightful. Two hundred and twenty-five had been killed or wounded, 
while only two of the garrison were killed, and twenty-two were wounded.^ The 
British departed for New York three days afterward" [June 31, 1776], and for 
>nore than two years, the din of war was not heard below the Roanoke. This 
'Victory had -a most inspiriting efiect upon the patriots throughout the land. 

' General Armstrong of Pennsylvania [page 193], had arrived in South Carolina in April, and 
took the general command. Lee arrived on the same day when the British, under Clinton, landed 
i)n Long Island. 

^ Born in South Carolina, in 1730. He was in the Cherokee war [page 204], in 1761. He was 
an active officer until made prisoner, in 1780, when for two years he was not allowed to bear arms. 
He died in 1805. General Moultrie wrote a very interesting memoir of the war in the South. 

^ At one time, every man but Admiral Parker was swept from the deck of his vessel. Among 
those wlio were badly wounded, was Lord William Campbell, the royal governor of South CaroUna, 
who afterward died of his wounds. 

* The Acieon, a large vessel, grounded on a shoal between Fort Sulhvan and the city, where 
she was burned by the Americans. 

* The strength of the fort consisted in the capacity of the spongy palmetto logs, upon which can- 
non-balls would make very little impression. It appeared to be a very insecure defense, and Lee 
advised Moultrie to abandon it when the British approached. But that brave officer would not 
desert it, and was rewarded with victory. Tlie ladies of Charleston presented his regiment with a 
pair of elegant colors, and the "slaughter pen," as Lee ironically called Fort Sullivan, was named 
Fort Moultrie. During the action, the staff, bearing a large flag, was cut down by a cannon-ball 
from the fleet. The colors fell outside the fort. A sergeant named Jasper, leaped doiATi from one 
of tlie bastions, and in the midst of the iron hail that was pouring from the fort, coolly picked up 
the flag, ascended to the bastion, and calling for a sponge-staff, tied the colors to it, stuck it in the 
emd, and then took his place among his companions in the fort. A few days afterward. Governor 
Rutledge took his own sword from his side, and presented it to the brave jasper; he also offered 
him a lieutenant's commission, which the young man modestly declined, because he could neither 
«ead nor write, saymg, " I am not fit to keep officers' company — I am but a sergeant." 

* Page 252. 




250 THE REVOLUTION. [1776. 

Important events in the progress of the war were now thickening. Re- 
bellion had become revolution. While the stirring events at the South, just 
mentioned, were transpiring, and while Wash- 
ington was augmenting and strengthening the 
continental army in New York, and British 
troops and German hirelings' were approach- 
ing by thousands, the Continental Congress, 
now in permanent session in the State House 
at Philadelphia, had a question of vast im^ 
portance under consideration. A few men, look- 
STATE HOUSE. Ing bcyoud the storm-clouds of the present, 

beheld bright visions of glory for their country, 
when the people, now declared to be rebels,^ and out of the protection of the 
British king, should organize themselves into a sovereign nation. " The light- 
ning of the Crusades was in the people's hearts, and it needed but a single 
electric touch, to make it blaze forth upon the world," says James, in writing 
of an earlier disruption of political systems.* So it was now, in the American 
colonies. Tlic noble figure of an independent nation stood forth with a beauty 
that almost demanded worship. The grand idea began to flash through the 
popular mind at the close of 1775 ; and when, early in 1776, it was tangibly 
spoken by Thomas Paine, in a pamphlet entitled Common Sense* (said to have 
been suggested by Dr. Rush),^ and whose vigorous thoughts were borne by the 
press to every community, a desire for mdepetidence filled the hearts of the 
people. In less than eighty days after the evacuation of Boston [March 17, 
1776], almost every provincial Assembly had spoken in favor of independence ; 
and on the 7th of June, in the midst of the doubt, and dread, and hesitation, which 
for twenty days had brooded over the Continental Congress, Richard Henry Lee,* 

' Page 246. ^ Page 246. ' History of the Crmades, by G. P. R. James. 

* The chief topic of this remarkable pamphlet, was the right and expediency of colonial inde- 
pendence. Paine also wrote a series of equally powerful papers, called The Crisis. The first num- 
ber was written in Fort Lee, ou the Hudson, in December, 1776, and published while Washington 
was on the banks of the Delaware. See page 192. These had a powerful effect in stimulating the 
people to efforts for indepeudence. Tliey were highly valued by the commander-in-chief, and he pro- 
moted their circulation. "Writing to a friend soon after the appearance of Common Sense, Washington 
said, " By private letters which I have lately received from Virginia, I find that Common Sense is 
working a powerful change there in the minds of many men." 

^ Benjamin Rush was one of the most eminent men of his time, as a physician, a man of science, 
and an active patriot during the whole Revolution. He was born twelve miles from Philadelphia, 
in 1745. He was educated at Princeton, completed his scientific studies in Edinburg, and after 
his return, he soon rose to the highest eminence in his profession. He was the recipient of many 
honors, and as a member of the Continental Congress, in 1776, he advocated and signed the Declar- 
ation of Independence. His labors during tlio prevalence of yellow fever in Philadelphia, in 1793, 
gave him the imperishable crown of a true philanthropist. He founded the Philadelphia Dispensary 
in 1786; and he was also one of the principal founders of Dickinson College, at Carlisle, Pennsyl- 
vania. He was president of the American Society for the abolition of slavery ; of the Philadelphia 
Medical Society ; vice-president of the Philadelphia Bible Society ; and one of the vice-presidents 
of the American Philosophical Society. He died in April, 1813, at the age of almost sixty-eight 
years. A portrait of Dr. Rush may be found on the next page. 

* Richard Henry Lee was born in Westmoreland county, Virginia, in 1732. He was educated 
in England, and was in public life most of the time after reaching his majority. He was one of the 
earliest opposers of the Stamp Act ; was a member of the first Continental Congress, and signed that 
Declaration of Independence which he so nobly advocated. He was afterward a member of the 
United States Senate; and soon after his retirement to private life, in 1794, lie died, when in the 



1776.] 



SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



251 



of Virginia, arose in his place, and with his clear, musical voice, read aloud 
the Resolution, "That these united colonies are, and, of right, ought to be, 
free and independent States ; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the 
British crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of 
Crreat Britain, is, and ought to be totally dissolved." ' 




/f^^^/^ 



This was an exceedingly bold step, and the resolution did not meet with 
general favor in Congress, at first. Many yet hoped, even against hope, for 
reconciliation, and thought it premature, and there were some timid ones who 
trembled while standing so near the borders of high treason. After debating 
the subject for three days, the further consideration of it was postponed until 
the first of July. A committee" was appointed [June 11], however, to draw 



sixty-third year of his age. A characteristic anecdote is told of his son, who was at school, in 
England, at the time the Declaration of Independence was promulgated. One day a gentleman 
asked his tutor, "What boy is this?" "He is the son of Richard Henry Lee, of America," the 
tutor replied. The gentleman put his hand on the boy's head, and said, " We shall yet see your 
father's head upon Tower Hill." The boy instantly answered, " You may have it when you can get 
it." That boy was the late Ludwell Lee, Esq. 

' On the 10th of May, Congress had, by resolution, recommended the establishment of independ- 
ent State governments in aU the colonies. This, however, was not suflBciently national to suit the 
bolder and wiser members of that body, and the people at large. Lee's resolution more fully 
expressed the popular will. 

* Thomas Jefferson, of Virginia ; John Adams, of Massachusetts ; Benjamin Franklin, of Penn- 
sylvania ; Roger Sherman, of Connecticut ; and Robert R. Livingston, of New York. Mr. Lee was 
summoned home to the bedside of a sick wife, on the day before the appointment of the commute^ 
or he would doubtless have been its chairman. 



252 THE REVOLUTION. [1776. 

up a declaration in accordance with the resolution, and were instructed to report 
on the same day when the latter should be called up. Thomas Jefferson, of 
Virginia, the youngest member of the committee, was chosen its chairman, and 
to him was assigned the task of preparing the Declaration. Adams and Frank- 
lin made a few alterations in his draft, and it was submitted to Congress at the 
same hour Avhen Mr. Lee's resolution was taken up for consideration. On the 
following day [July 2], the resolution was adopted by a large majority. The 
Declaration was debated almost two days longer ; and finally, at about mid-day, 
on the 4th of July, 1776, the representatives of thirteen colonies unanimously 
declared them free and independent States, under the name of The United 
States of Amekica. The Declaration was signed, but witli the name of 
John Hancock only, and thus it first went forth to the world. It was 
ordered to be written on parchment, and on the 2d of August following, 
the names of all but two of the fifty-six signers^ were placed upon it. 
These two were added afterward. It had then been read to the army f 
at public meetings ; from a hundred pulpits, and in all legislative halls in 
tlie land, and everywhere awakened the warmest responses of approval. 

Pursuant to instructions, General Howe proceeded toward New York, to 
meet General Clinton and Parker's fleet. He left Halifax on the 11th of June, 
[1776], and arrived at Sandy Hook" on the 29th. On the 2d of July he took 
possession of Staten Island, where he was joined by Sir Henry Clinton [July 
11], from the South,* and his brother. Admiral Lord Howe [July 12], with a 
fleet and a large land force, from England. Before the first of August, other 
vessels arrived with a part of the Hessian troops,^ and on that day, almost thirty 
thousand soldiers, many of them tried veterans, stood ready to fall upon the 
republican army of seventeen thousand men," mostly militia, which lay 
intrenched in New York and vicinity, less than a dozen miles distant.' The 

* This document, containing tlie autograplis of tliose venerated fathers of our republic, is care- 
fully preserved in a glass case, in the rooms of the National Institute at Washington city. Not one 
of aU that band of patriots now survives. Charles Carrol was the last to leave us. He departed in 
1832, at the age of ninety years. See Supplement. It is worthy of remembrance that not one of aU 
those signers of the Declaration of Independence, died with a tarnished reputation. The memory 
of all, is sweet. 

"^ Wasliington caused it to be read at the head of each brigade of the army, then in New York 
city, on the 9r,h of Jul}'. That night, citizens and soldiers pulled down the leaden equestrian statue 
of George III., which stood in the Bowling Green, and it was soon afterwai d converted into bullets 
for the use of the Continental army. The statue w;is gilded. The head of the horse was toward 
the Hud^n River. The Rev. Zachariah Greene, who died at Hempstead, Long Island, in June, 
1858, at the age of 99 years, heard the Declaration read to the soldiers. He was in the army. 

' Sandy Hook is a low ridge of sand, extending several miles down the New Jersey shore, from 
the entrance to Raritan or Amboy Bay. Between it and the shore, the water is navigable ; and 
near the mouth of Shrewsbury River, the ridge is broken by an inlet. * Page 249. 

* Page 246. 

* There were about twenty-seven thousand men enrolled, but not more than seventeen thousand 
men were fit for duty. A great many were sick, and a large number were without arms. 

^ Many of the ships passed through the Narrows, and anchored in New York Bay. Howe'a 
flag-ship, the Eagle, lay near Governor's Island. While in tliat position, a bold soldier went in a 
submarine vessel, wth a machine for blowing up a ship, and endeavored to fasten it to the bottom 
of the Ea/]le, but failed. He was discovered, and barely escaped. An explosion of the machine 
took place near the Earjlf, and the commander was so alarme<l, that she was hastUy moved further 
down the Bay. This machine was constructed by David Buslmell, of Connecticut, and was caUed a 
■torpedo. See Note 2, page 285. 



1776]. SECOND YEAR OP THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 253 

grand object in view was the seizure of New York and the country along 
the Hudson, so as to keep open a communication with Canada, separate the 
patriots of New England from those of the other States, and to overrun the most 
populous portion of the revolted colonies. This was the military plan, arranged 
by ministers. They had also prepared instructions to their commanding generals, 
to be pacific, if the Americans appeared disposed to submit. Lord Howe' and 
his brother, the general, were commissioned to " grant pardon to all who deserved 
mercy," and to treat for peace, but only on terms of absolute submission on the 
part of the colonies, to the will of the king and parliament. After making a 
foolish display of arrogance and weakness, in addressing General Washington, 
as a private gentleman," and being assured that the Americans had been guilty 
of no offense requiring a "pardon" at their hands, they prepared to strike an 
immediate and effective blow. The British army was accordingly put in motion 
on the morning of the 22d of August [1776], and during that day, ten 
thousand effective men, and forty pieces of cannon, were landed on the west- 
ern end of Long Island, between the present Fort Hamilton and Gravesend 
village. 

Already detachments of Americans under General 
Sullivan, occupied a fortified camp at Brooklyn, 
opposite New York, and guarded seven passes on a 
range of hills which extend from the Narrows to the 
village of Jamaica.* When intelligence of the landing 
of the invading army reached Washington, he sent 
General Putnam,^ with large reinforcements, to take 
the chief command on Long Island, and to prepare to 
meet the enemy. The American troops on the island 
now [August 26], numbered about five thousand. general putnam. 

The British moved in three divisions. The left, 

under General Grant, marched along the shore toward Gowanus ; the right, 
under Clinton and Cornwallis, toward the interior of the island ; and the cen- 
ter, composed chiefly of Hessians,'* under De Heister, marched up the Flatbush 
road, south of the hills. 

Clinton moved under cover of night, and before dawn on the morning of 

* Richard, Earl Howe, was brother of the young Lord Howe [page 197], killed at Ticonderoga, 
He was born in 1725, and died in 1799. 

^ The letters of Lord Howe to the American commander-in-chie^ were addressed, " George 
Washington, Esq." As that did not express the public character of the chief) and as he would not 
confer with the enemies of his country in a private capacity, Washington refused to receive tha 
letters. Howe was instructed not to acknowledge the authority of Congress in any way, and aa 
Washington had received his commission from that body, to address him as " general," would have 
been a recognition of its authority. He meant no disrespect to Washington, Congress, by resolu- 
tion, expressed its approbation of Washington's dignified course. 

^ General Nathaniel Green had been placed in command of this division, but having been pros- 
trated by bilious fever, about a week before the landing of the British at the Narrows, SuUivan was 
placed at the head of the troops. 

* Israel Putnam was born in Salem, Massaeliusetts, in 1718. He was a very useful oflScer 
during the French and Indian war, and was in active service in the continental armj', until 1779, 
when bodily infirmity compelled him to retire. He died in 1790, at the age of seventy-two yeaxs. 

* Page 246. 





254 THE KEVOLDTION. [177C 

the 27th, he had gained possession of the Jamaica 
pass, near the present East New York. At the 
same time, Grant was pressing forward along the 
shore of New York Bay, and at day-break, he 
encountered Lord StirUng,^ where the monuments 
of Greenwood cemetery now dot the hills. De 
Heister advanced from Flatbush at the same hour, 
and attacked Sullivan, who, having no suspicions 
J5ATTLB OF LONG- iSuAiTD. of the movements of Clinton, was watching the 

Flatbush Pass. A bloody conflict ensued, and while it was progressing, 
Clinton descended from the wooded hills, by the way of Bedford, to gain Sul- 
livan's rear. As soon as the latter perceived his peril, he ordered a retreat 
to the American lines at Brooklyn. It was too late; Clinton drove him back 
upon the Hessian bayonets, and after fighting desperately, hand to hand, with 
the foe in front and rear, and losing a greater portion of his men, Sullivan was 
compelled to surrender. 

As usual, misfortunes did not come single. While these disasters were 
occurring on the left, ComwaUis descended the port-road to Gowanus, and 
attacked Stirling. They fought desperately, until Stirling was made prisoner.' 
Many of his troops were drowned while endeavoring to escape across the Gow- 
anus Creek, as the tide was rising; and a large number were captured. At 
noon the victory for the British was complete. About five hundred Americans 
were killed or wounded, and eleven hundred were made prisoners. These were 
soon suffering dreadful horrors in prisons and prison-ships, at New York. 
The British loss in killed, wounded, and prisoners, was three hundred and sixty- 
seven. 

It was with the deepest anguish that Washington had viewed, from New 
York, the destruction of his troops, yet he dared not weaken his power in the 
city, by sending reinforcements to aid them. He crossed over on the following 
morning [August 28], with Mifflin,* who had come down from the upper end 
of York island with a thousand troops, and was gratified to find the enemy 
encamped in front of Putnam's hnes, and delaying an attack until the British 
fleet shoiild co-operate with him. This delay allowed Washington time to form 
and execute a plan for the salvation of the remainder of the army, now too 
weak to resist an assault with any hope of success. Under cover of a heavy 
fog, which fell upon the hostile camps at midnight of the 29th, and continued 
until the morning of the 30th, he silently withdrew them from the camp,' and, 



* William Alexander, Lord Stirling, was a deacendant of the Scotch earl of Stirling, mentioned 
in note 2, page 80. He was born in the city ot New York, in 1726. He became attached to the 
patriot cause, and was an active officer during the war. He died in 1783, aged tifty-seveu years. 

* Stirling was sent immediately ou board of the Eagle, Lord Howe's flag-ship. 

' Among the prisoners was General Nathaniel Woodhull [Note 1, page VJ8], late president of 
the provincial Congress of New York. He was taken prisoner ou the 30th, and after being severely 
wounded at the time, he was so neglected, that his injuries proved fatal in the course of a tew days. 
His age was fifty- three. See Onderdonk's Bevolutionary Incidents (rfLong Island. * Page 352. 

' During the night, a woman living near the present Fulton Ferry, where the Americans 
embarked, having beoeme offeoded at some of the patriots, sent her negro servant to inform th« 




Reteeat of ike Ajieeicans feom Long Islj 



1776.] SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 257 

unperceived by the British, they all crossed over to New York in safety, carry- 
ing every thing with them but their heavy cannons. When the fog rolled away, 
and the sunlight burst upon Brooklyn and New York, the last boat- load of 
patriots had reached the city shore. Mifflin, with his Pennsylvania battalion, 
and the remains of two broken Maryland regiments, formed the covering party. 
Washington and his staff, who had been in the saddle all night, remained until 
the last company had embarked. Surely, if " the stars in their courses fought 
against Sisera," in the time of Deborah,' the wings of the Cherubim of Mercy 
and Hope were over the Americans on this occasion. Howe, who felt sure of 
his prey, was greatly mortified, and prepared to make an immediate attack 
upon New York, before the Americans should become reinforced, or should 
escape from it.^ 

Unfortunately for the cause of freedom, at that time, the troops under 
Washington lacked that unity of feeling and moral stamina, so necessary for 
the accomplishment of success in any struggle. Had patriotism prevailed in 
every heart in the American army, it might have maintained its position in the 
city, and kept the British at bay. But there were a great many of merely 
selfish men in the camp. Sectional differences' weakened the bond of union, and 
immorality of every kind prevailed.* There was also a general spirit of insub- 
ordination, and the disasters on Long Island disheartened the timid. Hundreds 
deserted the cause, and went home. Never, during the long struggle of after 
years, was the hopeful mind of Washington more clouded by doubts, than 
during the month of September, 1776. In the midst of the gloom and perplex- 
ity, he called a council of war [Sept. 12th], and it was determined to send the 
military stores to Dobbs' Ferry, a secure place twenty-two miles up the Hud- 
son, and to retreat to and fortify Harlem Heights,^ near the upper end of York 

British of the movement. The negro fell into the hands of the Hessians. They could not under- 
stand a word of his language, and detained him until so late in the morning that his information was 
of no avail. ' Judges, chapter v., verse 20. 

"^ He ordered several vessels of war to sail around Long Island, and come down the Sound to 
Flushing Bay, so as to cover the intended landing of the troops upon the main [page 258], in 
Westcliester county. In tlie mean wliile, Howe made an overture for peace, supposing the late dis- 
aster would dispose the Americans to listen eagerly to almost any proposition for reconciliation. 
He parolled General SuUivan, and by him sent a verbal communication to Congress, suggesting a 
committee for conference. It was appointed, and consisted of Dr Franklin, John Adams, and 
Edward Rutledge. On the 11th of September, they met Lord Howe at the house of Captain Billop, 
on Staten Island, opposite Pertli Amboy. The committee would treat only for independence, and 
the conference had no practical result, except to widen the breach. "When Howe spoke patron- 
izingly oi protection for the Americans, Dr. Franklin told him courteously, that the Americans were 
not in need of British protection, for tliey were fully able to protect themselves. 

^ The army, which at first consisted chiefly of New England people, had been reinforced by 
others from New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia, all of them 
jealous of their respective claims to precedence, and materially differing in their social habits. 

* Cotemporary writers give a sad picture of the army at this time. Among many of the sub- 
ordinate officers, greed usurped the place of patriotism. Officers were elected on condition that Lney 
should throw their pay and rations into a joint stock for the benefit of a company ; surp^oons soW 
recommendations for furloughs, for able-bodied men, at sixpence each ; and a captain v:'as cashiered 
for stealing blankets from his soldiers. Men went out in squads to plunder from friend and foe, to 
the disgrace of the army. Its appointments, too, were in a wretched condition. The surgeons' 
department lacked instruments. According to a general return of fifteen regiments, there were not 
more than sufficient instruments for one battahon. [See Washington's Letter to Congress, Sept 
24, 1776.] 

* These extend from the plain on which the village of Harlem stands, about seven and a half 



258 THE IlEVOLUTIO]>r. [1776. 

Island.' This was speedily accomplished; and when, on the 15th, a strong 
detachment of the British army crossed the East River from Long Island, and 
landed three miles above the town, at Kipps' Bay (now foot of Thirty-fourth- 
street, East River), without much opposition,' the greater portion of the Amer- 
icans were busy in fortifying their new camp on Harlem Heights. 

The invading Britons formed a line almost across the island to Bloomingdale, 
within two miles of the American intrenchments, just beyond the present Man- 
hattanville, while the main army on Long Island was stationed at different 
points from Brooklyn to Flushing.^ On the 16th, detachments of the belliger- 
ents met on Harlem plains, and a severe skirmish ensued. The Americans 
were victorious, but their triumph cost the lives of two brave oflBcers — Colonel 
Knowlton of Connecticut, and Major Leitch of Virginia. Yet the effect of the 
\ictory was inspiriting ; and so fiiithfully did the patriots ply muscle and im- 
plement, that before Howe could make ready to attack them, they had con- 
structed double lines of intrenchments, and were prepared to defy him. At 
once perceiving the inutility of attacking the Americans in front, he next en- 
deavored to gain their rear. Leaving quite a strong force to keep possession 
of the city* [Sept. 20], he sent three armed vessels up the Hudson to cut off 
the communications of the Americans with New Jersey, while the great bulk 
of his army (now reinforced by an arrival of fresh troops from England)'^ made 
their way [Oct. 12] to a point in Westchester county," beyond the Harlem 
River. When Washington perceived the designs of his en- 
emy, he placed a garrison of almost three thousand men, 
under Colonel Magaw, in Fort Washington,' and withdrew 
the remainder of his army^ to a position on the Bronx River, 
in Westchester county, to oppose Howe, or retreat in safety 
to the Hudson Highlands, if necessary. He established his 
FORT WASHINGTON, hcad-quartcrs at White Plains village, and there, on the 28th 

miles from tlie City Hall, New York to Two Hundred and Sixth-street, near King's Bridge, at the 
upper end of the island. ' Also called Manhattan. See note 1, page 48. 

^ Some Connoeticut troops, frightened by the number and martial appearance of the British, 
fled at their approach. Washington, then at Harlem, heard the cannonade, leaped into his saddle, 
and approached Kipp's Bay in time to meet the flying fugitives. Mortified by this exhibition of 
cowardice before the enemy, the commander-in-chief tried to rally them, and in that efibrt, he was 
so unmindful of himselfj that he came near being captured. 

° Wishing to a.scertain the exact condition of the British army, Washington engaged Captain 
Nathan Hale, of Knowlton's regiment, to secretly visit their camps on Long Island, and make 
observations. He was caught, taken to Howe's head-quarters, Turtle Bay, New York, and exe- 
cuted as a spy by the brutal provost-marshal, Cunningham. He was not allowed to have a Bible 
nor clergyman during his last hours, nor to send letters to his friends. His fate and AndrWs [page 
326] have been compared. For particulars of this affair, see Onderdonk's Revolutionary fncidents 
0f Long Island, etc., and Lossing's Pictorial Field-Book of the Revolution. 

* At one o'clock on the morning of the 21st, a fire broke out in a small groggery near the foot 
of Broad-street, and before it was extinguished, about five hundred buildings were destroyed. The 
British charged the fire upon the Americans. Although such incendiarism had been contemplated 
when the Americans found themselves compelled to evacuate the city, this was purely accidental 

* The whole British army now numbered about 35,000 men. 

* Throg's Neck, sixteen miles from the city. 

^ Fort Washington was erected early in 1776, upon the highest ground on York Island, ten 
miles from the city, between One Hundred and Eighty-flrst-street and One Hundred and Eighty- 
sixth-streets, and overlooking both the Hudson and Harlem Rivers. There were a few traces of 
its embankments yet visible so late as 1856. 

" Nominally, uinetoin thousand men, but actually eflFective, not more than half that number. 




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>"5^AS]IIHM©^(D)W AIT IS3IIP°g IB^TTo 



177G.J SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR li'OR INDEPENDENCE. 259 

of October, a severe engagement took place.' The Americans were driven from 
their position, and three days afterward [Nov. 1, 1776], formed a strong camp 
on the hills of North Castle, five miles further north. The British general 
was afraid to pursue them ; and after strengthening the post at Peekskill, at 
the lower entrance to the Highlands, and securing the vantage-ground at North 
Castle," Washington crossed the Hudson [Nov. 12] with the main body of his 
army, and joined General Greene at Fort Lee, on the Jersey shore, about two 
miles south of Fort Washington. This movement was made on account of an 
apparent preparation by the British to invade New Jersey and march upon 
Philadelphia, where the Congress was in session.^ 

General Knyphausan and a large body of Hessians^ had arrived at New 
York, and joined the British army at Westchester, previous to the engagement 
at White Plains. After WiJshington had crossed the Hudson, these German 
troops and a part of the English army, five thousand strong, proceeded to attack 
Fort Washington. They were successful, but at a cost to the victors of full one 
thousand brave men.^ More than two thousand Americans were made prison- 
ers of war [Nov. 16], and like their fellow-captives on Long Island," they were 
crowded into IcMithsome prisons and prison-ships.'' Two days afterward [Nov. 
18], Lord Cornwallis, with six thousand men, crossed the Hudson at Dobbs' 
Ferry, and took possession of Fort Lee, which the Americans had abandoned 
on his approach, leaving all the baggage and military stores behind them. 
During the siege, General Washington, with Putnam, Greene, and Mercer, 
ascended the heights, and from the abandoned mansion of Roger Morris,* sur- 
veyed the scene of operations. Within fifteen minutes after they had left that 
mansion. Colonel Stirling, of the British army, who had just repulsed an 

' The combatants lost about an equal number of men — not more than three hundred eacli ia 
killed, wwunded, and prisoners. 

^ General Heath was left in command in the Highlands, and General Lee at North Castle. 

' Page 250. That body afterward adjourned to Baltunore. in Maryland. See page 262 

* Page 246. 

^ The loss of the Americans, in killed and wounded, did not exceed one hundred- 

» Page 254. 

' Nothing could exceed the horrors of these 
crowded prisons, as described by an eye-witness. 
The sugar-houses of New York being large, were 
used for the purpose, and therein scores suffered and 
died. But the most terrible scenes occurred on 
board several old hulks, which were anchored in the 
waters around New York, and used for prisoners. Of 
them the Jersey was the most notorious for the suf- 
ferings it contained, and the brutality of its officers. 
From these vessels, anchored near the present Navy the jersey prison-ship. 

Yard, at Brooklyn, almost eleven thousand victims 

were carried ashore during the war, and buried in shallow graves in the sand. Their remains wew 
gathered in 1808, and put in a vault situated near the termination of Front-street and Hudson- 
avenue, Brooklyn. See Onderdonk's EevoMionary Incidents of Long Island. Lossing's- Field Book, 
supplement. 

' That mansion, elegant even now [1883], is standing on the high bank of the Harlem River, 
at One Hundred and Sixty -ninth -street. Roger Morris was Washington's companion-in-arms on 
the field where Braddock was defeated, and he had married Mary Pliillipse, a young lady whoe© 
charms had captivated the heart of Washington wlien he was a young Virginia colonel. It was 
the property of Madame Jumel (widow of Aaron Burr, who was Vice-President of the United 
Slates, under JeffersonX at the time of her death in 1865. It now [1683] belongs to Nelson CliatJe. 




2(J0 THE REVOLUTION. [177ff. 

American part}', came with his victorious troops, and took possession of it. It 
■was a narrow escape for those chief commanders. 

A melancholy and a brilliant chapter in the history of the war for Inde- 
pendence, was now opened. For three weeks Washington, with his shattered 
and daily diminishing army, was flying before an overwhelming force of Brit- 
ons. Scarcely three thousand troops now remained in the American army. 
Newark, New Brunswick, Princeton, and Trenton, successively fell into the 
power of Cornwallis. So close were the British vanguards upon the rear of the 
Americans, sometimes, that each could hear the music of the other. Day after 
day, the militia left the army as their terms of enlistment expired, for late 
reverses had sadly dispirited them, and many of the regulars' deserted. Loyalists 
were swarming all over the country through which they passed," and when, on 
the 7th of December, Washington reached the froiaen banks of the Delaware, at 
Trenton, he had less than three thousand men, most of them wretchedly clad, 
half famished, and without tents to shelter them from the biting winter air. 
On the 8th that remnant of an army crossed the Delaware in boats, just as one 
division of Cornwallis's pursuing army marched into Trenton with all the pomp 
of victors, and sat down, almost in despair, upon the Pennsylvania shore. 

Washington had hoped to make a stand at New Brunswick, but was disap- 
pointed. The services of the Jersey and Maryland brigades expired on the day 
when he left that place, and neither of them would remain any longer in the 
army. During his flight, Washington had sent repeated messages to General 
Lee,^ urging him to leave North Castle,* and reinforce him. That oflBcer, am- 
bitious as he was impetuous and brave, hoping to strike a blow against the 
British that might give himself personal renown, was so tardy in his obedience, 
that he did not enter New Jersey until the Americans had crossed the Dela- 
ware. He had repeatedly, but in vain, importuned General Heath, who was. 
left in command at Peekskill, to let him have a detachment of one or two thou- 
sand men, with which to operate. His tardiness in obedience, cost him his 
liberty. Soon after entering New Jersey, he was made a prisoner [December 



* Note 6, page 185. 

^ General Howe had sent out proclamations through the country, offering pardon and protection, 
to aU who might ask for mercy. Perceiving the disasters to the American arms during the summer 
and autumn, great numbers took advantage of these promises, and signed petitions. They soon 
found that protection did not foUow pardon, for the Hessian troops, in their march through New 
Jersey, committed great excesses, without inquiring whether their victims were Whigs or Tories. 
Note 4, page 226. Among the prominent men who espoused the republican cause, and now aban- 
doned it, was Tucker, president of the New Jersey Convention, which had sanctioned the Declara- 
tion of Independence, and Joseph GaUoway, a member of the iirst Continental Congress. These, 
and other prominent recusants, received some hard hits in the pubUc prints. A writer in the Penn- 
Mylvania Journal, of February 5, 1777, thus castigated Galloway: 

" GaUVay has fled, and join'd the venal Howe, 
To prove his baseness, see him cringe and bow; 
A t.aitor to his country and its laws, 
A friend to tyrants and their cursed cause. 
Unhappy wretch I thy interest must be sold 
For Continental, not for polish'd gold. 
To sink the money thou thyself cried down, 
And stabb'd thy country to support the crown." 

» Note 4, page 185. « Page 259- 



i776.] SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 261 

13, 1776], and his command devolved upon General Sullivan.' At about the 
same time intelligence reached the chief that a British squadron, under Sir 
Peter Parker (who, as we have seen [page 247], was defeated at Charleston), 
had sailed into Narraganset Bay [December 8th], taken possession of Rhode 
Island, and blockaded the little American fleet, under Commodore Hopkins,' 
then lying near Providence. This intelligence, and a knowledge of the failure 
of operations on Lake Champlain,^ coupled with the sad condition of the main 
^rmj of patriots, made the future appear gloomy indeed.* 

It was fortunate for the patriot cause that General Howe was excessively 
cautious and indolent. Instead of allowing Cornwallis to construct boats," cross 
the Delaware at once, overwhelm the patriots, and push on to Philadelphia, as 
he might have done, he ordered him to await the freezing of the waters, so as 
to cross on the ice. He was also directed to place four thousand German troops 
in cantonments along the Jersey shore of the river, from Trenton to Burling- 
ton, and to occupy Princeton and New Brunswick with strong British detach- 
ments. Both Congress and Washington profited by this delay. Measures for 
re-organizing the army, already planned, were put in operation. A loan of five 
millions of dollars, in hard money, with which to pay the troops, was author- 
ized. By the offer of liberal bounties," and the influence of a stirring appeal 
put forth by Congress, recruits immediately flocked to Washington's standard 
at Newtown.' Almost simultaneously, Lee's detachment under Sullivan, and 
another from Ticonderoga,* joined him ; and on the 24th of December he found 
himself in command of almost five thousand effective troops, many of them fresh 
and hopeful.'' And the increased pay of ofiicers, the proffered bounties to the 

' Both Sullivan and Stirling, v/ho were made prisoners on Long Island [page 254], had been 
exchanged, and were now again vdth the army. Lee was captured at Baskingridge, where Lord 
Stirling resided, and remained a prisoner until May, 1778, when he was exchanged for General 
Prescott, who was captured on Rhode Island. See page 271. * Note 1, page 307. 

^ General Gates was appointed to the command of the army at the north, after the death of 
General Thomas [note 2, page 243]; and during the summer and autumn of 1776, Colonel Arnold 
became a sort of commodore, and commanded flotillas of small vessels in warfare with others pre- 
pared by General Carleton (the British commander in Canada), on Lake Champlain. He had two 
severe engagements (11th and 13th of October), in which he lost about nmety men; the British 
about forty. These operations were disastrous, yet they resulted in preventing the British forces in 
'Canada uniting with those in New York, and were thus of vast importance. 

■* Although the Americans had generally suffered defeats, they had been quite successful in 
making captives. The number of Americans taken by the British, up to the close of 1776, was 
four thousand, eight hundred and fifty-four ; the number of British taken by the Americans, was 
two thousand, eight hundred and sixty. In addition to men, the Americans had lost twelve brass 
cannons and mortars, and two hundred and thirty-five made of iron ; twenty-three thousand, nine 
hundred and seventy-nine empty shells, and seventeen thousand, one hundred and twenty-two 
filled ; two thousand six hunclred and eighty-four double-headed shot : a large quantity of grape- 
.shot; two thousand eight hundred muskets: four hundred thousand cartridges ; sixteen barrels of 
powder ; five hundred intrenching tools ; two hundred barrows and other instruments, and a large 
quantity of provis'ons and stores. 

^ The Americans took every boat they could find at Trenton, and cautiously moved them out 
of the river after they had crossed. 

® Each soldier was to have a bounty of twenty dollars, besides an allotment of land at the close 
of the war. A common soldier was to have one hundred acres, and a colonel five hundred. These 
were given to those only who enlisted to serve " during the war." 

' A small village north of Bristol, about two miles fi-om the Delaware. ^ Page 234. 

' According to the adjutant's return to "Washington on the 2 2d of December, the American 
«.rmy numbered ten thousand one hundred and six men, of whom five thousand three hundred and 
nmety-nine were sick, on command elsewhere, or on furlough, leaving au effective force of four 
■ihousand seven hundred and seven. 



262 THE REYOLUTION. [111^, 

soldiers, and the great personal influence of the commander-in-chief, had the 
effect to retain in the service, for a few weeks at least, more than one half of the 
old soldiers. 

There were about fifteen hundred Hessians.' and a troop of British light 
horse, at Trenton, and these Washington determined to surprise. The British 
commanders looked with such contempt upon the American troops — the mere 
ghost of an army — and were so certain of an easy victor j beyond the Delaware, 
where, rumor affirmed, the people were almost unanimous in favor of the 
king, that vigilance was neglected. So confident were they that the contest 
would be ended by taking possession of Philadelphia, that Cornwallis actually 
returned to New York, to prepare to sail for England ! And when Rail, the 
commander of the Hessians at Trenton, applied to General Grant for a rein- 
forcement, that officer said to the messenger, "Tell the colonel he is very safe. 
I will undertake to keep the peace in New Jersey, with a corporal's guard." 
How they mistook the character of Washington ! During all the gloom of the 
past month, hope had beamed brightly upon the heart of the commander-in- 
chief Although Congress had adjourned to Baltimore' [December 12, IT 76], 
and the public mind was filled with despondency, his reliance upon ProvidencG 
in a cause so just, was never shaken ; and his great soul conceived, and his 
ready hand planned a bold stroke for deliverance. The Christmas holiday was 
at hand — a day when Germans, especially, indulge in convivial pleasures. Not 
doubting the Hessians would pass the day in sports and drinking, he resolv^ed 
to profit by their condition, by falling suddenly upon them while they were in 
deep slumber after a day and night of carousal. His plan was to cross the 
Delaware in three divisions, one a few miles above Trenton, another a few miles 
below, and a third at Bristol to attack Count Donop^ at Burlington. Small 
parties were also to attack the British posts at -Blount Holly, Black Horse, and 
Bordentown, at the same time. 

On the evening of Christmas day [1776], Washington gathered twenty- 
four hundred men, with some lieavy artillery, at McConkey's Ferry, 
eight or nine miles above Trenton." They expected to cross, reach Trenton' 
ftt midnight, and take the Hessians by surprise. But the river was filled' 
with floating ice, and sleet and snow were fiilling fast. The passage was 
made in flat-boats ; and so difficult was the navigation, that it was almost four 
o'clock in the morning [December 26] when the troops were mustered on 
the Jersey shore. They were arranged in two divisions, commanded respec- 
tively by Greene and Sullivan, and approached Trenton by separate roads. 
The enterprise was eminently successful. Colonel Ball, the Hessian com- 
mander, was yet indulging in wine at the end of a night spent in card- 



' Page 246. 

' Alarmed at the approach of the British, Congress thought it prudent to adjourn to Baltimore. 
}l committee to represent that body was left in Philadelphia, to co-operate -with the army. Cong-ress 
assembled at Baltimore on the 20th. ' Page 275. 

* Taylorsville is the name of the little village at that place. The river there, now spanned hy 
a covered bridge, is about six hundred feet in -width, and has a considerable current. 




BATTLE AT TRENTON. 



1776.] SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 268 

playing, when the Americans approached, a little after sunrise;' and while 
endeavoring to rallj his affrighted troops, he fell, mortally wounded, in the 
streets of Trenton. Between forty and fifty of 
the Hessians were killed and fatally wounded, 
and more than a thousand were made prisoners, 
together with arms, ammunition, and stores. 
Five hundred British cavalry barely escaped, 
and fled to Bordentown. Generals Ewing and 
Cadwalader, who commanded the other two 
divisions, destined to attack the enemy below 
Trenton, were unable to cross the river on account of the ice, to co-operate with 
Washington. With a strong enemy so near as Burlington and Princeton, the com- 
mander-in-chief thought it imprudent to remain on the Jersey shore, so with his 
prisoners and booty he re-crossed the DelaAvare on the evening after his victory. 
■ This was indeed a victory in more aspects than that of a skillful military 
operation. The Germans under Dunop, on the river below, thoroughly 
alarmed, fled into the interior. The Tories and pliant Whigs' were abashed ; 
the friends of liberty, rising from the depths of despondency, stood erect in the 
pride and strength of their principles ; tlie prestige of the Hessian name, lately 
eo terrible, was broken, and the faltering militia, anxious for bounties and 
honors, flocked to the victorious standard of Washington. Fourteen hundred 
soldiers, chiefly of the eastern militia, whose terms of enlistment would expire 
■with the year, agreed to remain six weeks longer, on a promise to each of a 
bounty of ten dollars. The mihtary chest was not in a condition to permit him 
to fulfill his promise, and he wrote to Robert Morris, the eminent financier of 
the Revolution, for aid, and it was given. Fifty thousand dollars, in hard 
money, Avere sent to the banks of the Delaware, in time to allow Washington 
to fulfill his engagement.* 

The victory was also productive of more vigilant efforts on the part of the 



' Rail spent the night at the bouse of a loyalist, named Hunt. Just at dawu, a messenger, sent 
by a Tory on the line of march of the patriots, came in hot haste to the colonel . Excited by wine, 
and intent upon bis game, that officer thrust thenote into bis pocket. Like the Thebau polemarch, 
who, when be received dispatches relative to a conspiracy, refused to open tliem, saying, " Busi- 
ness to-morrow," Rail did uot look at the message, but continued his amusement until the roll of 
the American's drum, and the crack of bis rifle, fell upon his dull ears, aud called him to duty. 

2 Note 4, page 22t). 

' Then it was that Robert Morris not only evinced bis faith in the success of the patriot cause, 
and bis own love of couutry, but he tested the strength of bis credit and mercantile honor. The 
sum was large, and the requirement seemed almost impossible to meet- Goverment credit waa 
low, but confidence in Robert Morris was unbounded. On leaving his office, musing upon how he 
should obtain the money, be met a wealthy Quaker, and said," 1 want money for the use of the 
army." " Robert, what security canst thou give 1 " asked the Quaker. " My note and my honor." 
promptly replied Morris. "Thou slialt have it," as promptly responded the lender, who otl'ered him 
a considerable sum, and the next morning it was on its way to the camp of Washington. Robert 
Morris was a native of England, where he was born in 1733. He came to America in 1744, and 
became a merchant's clerk in Philadelphia. By the force of industry, energy, and a good character, 
he arose to the station of one of the tirst merchants of his time. He was a signer of the Declaration 
of Independence, and was active as a public financier, throughout the war. Toward its close 
[1781], he was instrumental in establishing a national bank. After the war, he was a state legis- 
lator, and Washington wished him to be bis first Secretary of the Treasury, but he declined it. By 
land speculations he lost his fortune, and died in comparative poverty, in May, 1806, when a little 
more than seventy years of age. See bis portrait on next page. 



264 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1776. 



invaders. Believing the rebellion to be at an end, and the American army 
hopelessly annihilated, wiien Washington, with his shivering, half-starved 
troops, jfled across the Delaware, Cornwallis, as we have observed, had returned 
to New York to embark for England. The contempt of the British for the 




"rebels," was changed to respect and fear, and when intelligence of the affair 
at Trenton reached Howe, he ordered Cornwallis back with reinforcements, to 
gain the advantage lost. Congress, in the mean while, perceiving the necessity 
of giving more power to the commander-in-chief, wisely clothed him [December 
27] with all the puissance of a military dictator, for six months, and gave him 
absolute control of all the operations of war, for that period.* This act was 
accomplished before that body could possibly have heard of the victory at Tren- 
ton, for they were then in session in Baltimore. 

Inspirited by his success at Trenton, the panic of the enemy, and their 
retirement from the Delaware, Washington determined to recross that river, 
and act on the offensive. He ordered General Heath, who was with quite a 



' When Congress adjourned on the 12th, to meet at Baltimore, almost equal powers were given 
to "Washington, but they were not then defined. Now they were so, by resolution. They wrote to 
"Washington, when they forwarded the resolution, " Happy is it for this country, that the general 
of their forces can be safely intrusted with unlimited power, and neither personal security, liberty, 
nor property, be in the least degree endangered thereby." At that time, Congress had given Gen- 
eral Putnam almost unlimited command in Pliiladclphia. All munitions of war there, were placed 
under his control. He was also authorized to employ all private armed vessels in the Delaware, in. 
the defense of Philadelphia. See note 1, page 246. 



1777.] THIRD TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 265 

large body of New England troops at Peekskill,' to move into New Jersey 
with his main force ; and the new militia levies were directed to annoy the flank 
and rear of the British detachments, and make frequent attacks upon their 
outposts. In the mean Avhile, he again crossed the Delaware [December 30th], 
with his whole army, and took post at Trenton, while the British and German 
troops were concentrating at Princeton, only ten miles distant. Such was the 
position and the condition of the two armies at the close of the second year of 
the War for Independence — the memorable year when this great Republic of 
the West was born. 



CHAPTER TV 

THIRD TEAR OP THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. [l77v.j 

The strange apathy of nations, like individuals, in times of great danger, or 
^hen dearest interests depend upon the utmost vigilance and care, is a remark- 
able phase in human character, and the records thereof appear as monstrous 
anomalies upon the pages of history. Such was the case with the executive 
and legislative power of the British nation during the momentous year of 1776, 
when the eye of ordinary forecast could not fail to perceive that the integrity 
of the realm was in imminent danger, and that the American colonies, the fair- 
est jewels in the British crown, were likely to be lost forever. Such an apathy, 
strange and profound, seemed to pervade the councils of the British Govern- 
ment, even while the ipublic mind of England was filled with the subject of the 
American rebellion. Notwithstanding an army had been driven from one city" 
[March, 1776], a fleet expelled from another^ [June], their colonies declared 
independent^ [Jn\y 4], and almost thirty thousand of their choice troops and 
fierce hirelings had been defied and combatted^ [August], Parliament did not 
assemble until the last day of October, to deliberate on these important mat- 
ters. Then the king, in his speech, congratulated them upon the success of the 
royal troops in America, and assured them (but without the shadow of good 
reason for the belief) that most of the continental powers entertained friendly 
feelings toward Great Britain. During a dull session of six weeks, new sup- 
plies for the American service were voted, while every conciliatory proposition 
was rejected ; and when Parliament adjourned, in December, to keep the 
Christmas holidays, the members appeared to feel that their votes bad crushed 
the rebellion, and that, on their re-assembling in January, they would be in- 
vited to join in a Te Deu?n^ at St. Paul's, because of submission and peace in 

' On the east bank of the Hudson, at the entrance to the HigMands, forty-five miles from the 
city of New Tork. See page 270. 

^ Page 247. . ' Page 249. ■* Page 251. » Page 253. 

" The Te Deum Landamus ( We ■praise thee, God) is always chanted in churches in England, 
and on the continent, after a great victory, great deliverance, etc. There is something revolting in 




266 THE REVOLUTION. [I'm. 

America. At that very moment, Washington was planning his brilliant 
achievement on the banks of the Delaware.' 

In contrast with this apathy of the British Government, was the vigilance 
and activity of the Continental Congress. Their perpetual session was one of 
perpetual labor. Early in the year [March. 1776], the 
Secret Committee of that body had appointed Silas Deane,* 
a delegate from Connecticut, to proceed to France, as their 
agent, with general powers to solicit the co-operation of 
other governments. Even these remote colonists knew 
that the claims of the king of England to the friendship 
of the continental powers, was fallacious, and that France, 
Spain, and Holland, the Prince of Orange, and even Cath- 
sTT \s DE\NE. arine of Russia, and Pope Clement the Fourteenth (Gan- 

ganelli), all of whom feared and hated England, instead of being friendly to 
her, were anxious for a pretense to strike her fiercely, and humble her pride, 
because of her potency in arms, her commerce, her diplomacy, and her strong 
Protestantism. All of these spoke kindly to the American agent, and Deane 
was successful in his embassy. He talked confidently, and by skillful manage- 
ment, during the summer of 1776, he obtained fifteen thousand muskets from 
the French arsenals, and abundant promises of men and money. And when the 
Declaration of Independence had been made [July 4], Congress appointed a reg- 
ular embassy^ [Sept. 22, 1776], to the court of France, and finally sent agents 
to other foreign courts.^ They also planned, and finally executed measures for 
strengthening the bond of union between the several colonies, already made 
powerfully cohesive by common dangers and common hopes. Articles of Con- 
federation^ which formed the organic laws of the nation until the adoption of 

this to the time Christian mind and heart. War, except strictly defensive as a last extremity, ia 
always a monstrous injustice ; and for its success in soddening God's fair earth with human blood, 
men in epaulettes, their hands literally dripping with gore, will go into the temple dedicated to the 
Frince of Peace, and there sing a Te Deum! * Page 261. 

^ Silas Deane was born at Groton, in Connecticut, and was educated at Tale College. He was 
elected to the first Congress [page 228] in 1774, and after being some time abroad, as agent for the 
Secret Committee, he was recalled, on account of alleged bad conduct. He published a defense of 
his character in 1778, but he failed to reinstate himself in the public opinion. He went to England 
toward the close of 1784, where he died in extreme poverty, in 1789. 

' The embassy consisted of Dr. Franklin, Silas Deane, and Arthur Lee. Franklin and Lee 
joined Deane at Paris, at the middle of December, 1776. Lee had then been in Europe for some 
time, as a sort of private agent of the Secret Committee. He made an arrangement with the French 
king to send a large amount of arms, ammunition, and specie, to the colonists, but in such a way 
that it would appear as a commercial transaction. The agent on the part of the French wa» 
Beaumarchais, who assumed the commercial title of Roderique Hortales & Co., and Lee took the 
name of Mary Johnson. This arrangement with the false and avaricious Beaumarchais, was a source- 
of great annoyance and actual loss to Congress in after years. "U^hat was a gratuity on the part of 
the French government,, in the name of Hortales & Co., Beaumarchais afterward presented a claim 
for, and actually received from Congress four hundred thousand dollars. Benjamin Franklin was 
bom in Boston, in 1706. He was a printer; worked at his trade in London ; became eminent in 
his business in Philadelphia; obtained a high position as a philosopher and statesman ; was agent 
in England for several colonies; was chief embassador for the United States in Europe during the 
Revolution, and filled various official stations in the scientific and political world. He was one of 
the most remarkable men that ever lived ; and, next to Washington, is the best known and most 
revered of all Americans. He died in 1790, at the age of more than eighty-four years Arthur 
lee was a brother of Richard Henry Lee [page 250], and was born in Virginia, in 1740. Me waa 
a fine scholar, and elegant writer. "lie died in 1782. * Holland,' Spain, and Prussia. 



1111.] 



THIRD TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



267 



the Federal Constitution, were, after more than two years' consideration, ap- 
proved by Congress, and produced vastly beneficial results during the remain^ 
der of the struggle.' 




Such, in brief, were the chief operations of the civil power of the revolted 
colonies. Let us now turn to the military operations at the opening of a new 

* In July, 1775, Dr. Franklin submitted a plan of union to Congress. On the 11th of .June, 
1776, a committee was appointed to draw up a plan. Their report was laid aside, and not called 
up until April, 1777. From the 2d of October until the 15th of November following, tlie subject 
was regularly debated two or three times a week, wlien thirteen Articles of Confederation wero 
adopted. The substance was that the thirteen confederated States should be known as the United 
States of America; that all engage in a reciprocal treaty of alliance and friendship, for mutual ad- 
vantage, each to assist the other when help should be needed ; that each State should have tl>Q 
right to regulate its own internal affairs; that no State should separately send or receive embassies, 
begin any negotiations, contract engagements or alliances, or conclude treaties with any foreign 
power, witliout the consent of the general Congress : that no public officer should be allowed to 
accept any presents, emoluments, ofQce, or title, from any foreign power, and that neither Con- 
gress nor State governments should possess the power to confer any title of nobility; that none 
of the States should have the right to form alliances among themselves, without the consent of 
Congress; that they should not have the power to levy duties contrary to the enactments of Con- 
gress; that no State should keep up a standing army or ships of war, in time of peace, beyond 
the amount stipulated by Congress ; that when any of the States should raise troops for the com- 
mon defense, all the officers of the rank of colonel and under, should be appointed by the Legis- 
lature of the State, and the superior officers by Congress ; that all expenses of the war sliould be 
paid out of the public treasury ; that Congress alone should have the power to coin money; and 
that Canada might at any time be admitted iuto the confederacy when she felt disposed. The last 
clauses were explanatory of the power of certain governmental operations, and contained details 
of the s»me. Such was the form of government wliich existed for several years. See Supplement. 



268 THE IIEV0LUTI015. [1777. 

year. Congress, we have observed/ delegated all military power to Washing- 
ton, and he used it with energy and discretion. We left him at Trenton, pre- 
pared to act offensively or defensively, as circumstances should require. There 
he was joined by some troops under Generals Mifflin and Cadwalader, who 
came from Bordentown and Crosswicks, on the night of the 1st of January. 
Yet with these, his effective force did not exceed five thousand men. Toward 
the evening of the 2d of January, 1777, Cornwallis, with a strong force, ap- 
proached from Princeton, and after some skirmishing, the two armies encamped 
on either side of a small stream which runs through the town, within pistol- 
shot of each other. Washington commenced intrenching his camp, and Corn- 
wallis, expecting reinforcements in the morning, felt sure of his prey, and 
deferred an attack for the night. 

The situation of Washington and his little army was now perilous in the 
extreme. A conflict with such an overwhelming force as was gathering, 
appeared hopeless, and the Delaware becoming more obstructed by ice every 
hour, rendered a retreat across it, in the event of a surprise, almost impossible. 
A retreat down the stream was equally perilous. An escape under cover of the 
night, was the only chance of safety, but the ground was too soft to allow the 
patriots to drag their heavy cannons with them ; and could they withdraw unob- 
served by the British sentinels, whose hourly cry could be heard from the 
camp ? This was a question of deep moment, and there was no time for long 
deliberation. A higher will than man's determined the matter. The Protector 
of the righteous put forth his hand. While a council of war was in session, 
toward midnight, the wind changed, and the ground was soon so hard frozen, 
that there could be no difficulty in conveying away the cannons. Instantly all 
was in activity in the American camp, while Cornwallis and his army were 
soundly sleeping — perhaps dreaming of the expected sure victory in the morn- 
ing. Leaving a few to keep watch and feed the camp-fires, to allay suspicion, 
Washington silently withdrew, with all his army, artillery, and baggage ; and 
at dawn [January 3, 1777], heAvas in sight of Princeton, prepared to fall upon 
Cornwallis's reserve there /^ The British general had scarcely recovered from 
his surprise and mortification, on seeing the deserted camp of the Americans, 
when the distant booming of cannons, borne upon the keen winter air, fell 
ominously upon his ears. Although it was mid-winter, he thought it was the 
rumbling of distant thunder. The quick ear of General Erskine decided other- 
wise, and he exclaimed, "To arms, general! Washington has out-generaled 
us. Let us fly to the rescue at Princeton !" Erskine was right, for, at that 
moment, Washington and the British reserve were combating. 

Owing to the extreme roughness of the roads, Washington did not reach 
Princeton as early as he expected, and instead of surprising the British, and 
then pushing forward to capture or destroy the enemy's stores at New Bruns- 
wick, he found a portion of the troops already on their march to join Corn- 

' Pas^e 264. 

" A brigade, under Lieutenant-colonel Mawhood, consisting of three regiments and three troopa 
of dragoons, were quartered there. 



1777.] 



THIRD YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



269 




BATTLE AT PRINCETON. 



wallis at Trenton. A severe encounter occurred, when the American militia 
giving way, the British, with a victorious shout, rushed forward, expecting to 

produce a general rout. At that moment Washington 

advanced with a select corps, brought order out of con- 
fusion, and leading on his troops with waving sword and 
cheering voice, turned the tide of battle and achieved a 
victory. The brave General Mercer,' while fighting at 
the head of his men, was killed, and many other be- 
loved officers were lost on that snowy battle-field.' Nor 
was the conflict of that morning yet ended. When Corn- 
wallis perceived the desertion of the American camp, 
and heard the firing at Princeton, he hastened with a 
greater portion of his troops, to the aid of his reserve, 
and to secure his stores at New Brunswick. The Ameri- 
cans, who had not slept, nor scarcely tasted food for 
thirty-six hours, were compelled, just as the heat of the first battle was over, to 
contest Avith fresh troops, or fly with the speed of strong men. Washington 
chose the latter alternative, and when Cornwallis entered Princeton, not a 
" rebel" was to be found.' History has no parallel to ofler to these events of 
a few days. Frederic the Great of Prussia, one of the most renowned com- 
manders of modern times, declared that the achievements of Washington and 
his little band of compatriots, between the 25th of December and the 4th of 
January following, were the most brilliant of any recorded in the annals of 
military performances. 

The Americans were too weak to attempt the capture of the British stores 
at New Brunswick, so, with his fatigued troops Washington retreated rapidly 
toward the hill country of East Jersey.* Allowing time only to refresh his 
little army at Pluckemin, he pressed forward to Morristown, and there estab- 
lished his winter quarters. But he did not sit down in idleness. After plant- 
ing small cantonments^ at different points from Princeton to the Hudson 
Highlands, he sent out detachments to harass the thoroughly perplexed British. 
These expeditions were conducted with so much skill and spirit, that on the first 



' Mercer's horse had been shot under him, and he was on foot at the head of his men, when a 
British soldier felled him with a clubbed musket [note 4, page 236]. At first, the British believed 
it to be "Washington, and, with a shout, they cried, " The rebel general is taken." Hugh Mercer 
was a native of Scotland. He was a surgeon on the field of Culloden, and was practicing medicine 
in Fredericksburg, Virginia, when the Revolution broke out. He was with Washington in the 
French and Indian War. He was made commander of the flying camp in 1776, and at the time of 
his death was about fifty-six years of age. The picture of a house in the corner of the map of the 
battle at Princeton, is a representation of the house ui which General Mercer died. It is yet [1867] 
standing. 

^ Tlie chief of these were Colonels Haslett and Potter, Major Morris, and Captains Shippen, 
Fleming and Neal. The loss of the Americans in this engagement, was about thirty, including the 
officers above named. 

' We have mentioned, on page 210, the planetarium, at Princeton, constructed by David Ritten- 
house. This excited the admiration of Cornwallis, and he intended to carry it away with him. It 
is also said that Silas Deane [page 264] proposed to present this work of art to the French govern- 
ment, as a bonus for its good will. ComwalUs was kept too busy in providing for his own safety, 
while in Princeton, to allow him to rob the college of so great a treasure. * Page 160, 

* Permanent stations for small bodies of troops. 



270 THE REVOLUTION. [IIIX 

of March, 1777, not a British nor a Hessian soldier could be found in 
New Jersey, except at New Brunswick and Amboy/ Those dreaded bat- 
talions which, sixtj days before, were all-powerful in New Jersey, and had 
frightened the Continental Congress from Philadelphia, were now hemmed in 
upon the Raritan, and able to act only on the defensive. Considering the 
attending circumstances, this was a great triumph for the Americans. It 
revived the martial spirit of the people, and the hopes of all good patriots ; and 
hundreds in New Jersey, who had been deceived by Howe's proclamation, and 
had suffered Hessian brutality, openly espoused the Whig cause. Congress 
had returned to Philadelphia,' and commenced its labors with renewed vigor. 

It was almost the first of June before the main body of the two armies com- 
menced the summer campaign. In the mean while, smaller detachments were 
in motion at various points. A strong armament was sent up the Hudson, in 
March, to destroy American stores at Peekskill, at the southern entrance to the 
Highlands. The Americans there, under the command of General McDougal, 
perceiving a defense of the property to be futile, set fire to the stores and 
retreated to the hills in the rear. The British returned to New York the same 
evening [March 23, 1777]. Almost a month afterward [April 13], Corn- 
wallis went up the Raritan from New Brunswick, to surprise the Americans 
under General Lincoln, at Boundbrook. The latter escaped, with difficulty, 
after losing about sixty men and a part of his baggage. Toward the close of 
April [April 25], Governor Tryon,^ at the head of two thousand British and 
Tories, went up Long Island Sound, landed at Compo [April 26], between 
NorAvalk and Fairfield, marched to Danbury, destroyed a large quantity of 
stores belonging to the Americans, burned the town, and cruelly treated the 
inhabitants. Perceiving the militia to be gathering in great numbers, he 
retreated rapidly the next morning, by way of Ridgefield. Near that village, 
he had some severe skirmishing with the militia under Generals Wooster, 
Arnold,* and Silliman. Wooster was killed,^ Arnold narrowly escaped, but 
Silliman, keeping the field, harassed the British all the way to the coast. At 
Compo, and while embarking, they Avere terribly galled by artillery under 
Lamb." Tryon lost almost three hundred men during this expedition, and 
killed or wounded about half that number of Americans. His atrocities on that 



' The Americans went out in small companies, made sudden attacks upon pickets, out-posts, 
and foraging parties, and in this way frightened the detachments of the enemy and drove them in 
to the main body on the Raritan. At Springfield, a few miles from Elizabethtown, they 
attacked a party of Hessians who were penetrating the country from Elizabethpcjrt [January 7, 
1777], killed between forty and fifty of them, and drove the remainder in great confusion back to 
Staten Island. A larger foraging party was defeated near Somerset court house [January 20] by 
about five hundred New Jersey militia under General Dickinson ; and Newark, Elizabethtown and 
Woodbridge, were taken possession of by the patriots. ^ Page 262. ' Page 223. 

* Page 23-1. For his gallantry at Ridgefield, Congress ordered a horse, richly caparisoned, to 
be presented to him. 

^ David Wooster was born in Stratford, Connecticut, in 1710. He was at Louisburg in 1745 
[page 137], became a captain in the British army, and was in the French and Indian War. He was 
in Canada in the spring of 1776 [page 243], and gave promise of being one of the most efficient of 
the American officers in the war for Independence. His loss, at such a critical period of the conflict 
was much deplored. The State of Connecticut erected a monument to his memory, in 1854. 

• Page 240. 



1777.] THIRD YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. £71 

occasion were never forgotten nor forgiven. The name of Try on will ever be 
held in detestation hy all lovers of justice and humanity. He had already, 
while governor of North Carolina, been named by the Indians, The Great 
Wolf, and in his marauding expeditions during the earlier years of the war 
for Independence, his conduct confirmed the judgment of the Red Men. We 
shall meet him again. 

The Americans did not always act upon the defensive : they were some- 
times the aggressors. Toward the close of May [May 22, 1777 J, Colonel 
Meigs, with one hundred and seventy men, crossed Long Island Sound in whale- 
boats, from Guilford, Connecticut, and at two o'clock in the morning of the 23d 
of that month, attacked a British provision post at Sagg Harbor, near the 
eastern extremity of Long Island. They burned a dozen vessels, and the store- 
houses and contents, secured ninety prisoners, and reached Guilford at two 
o'clock the next day, without losing a man of their own party. For this exploit, 
Congress voted thanks to Colonel Meigs and his men, and a sword to the com- 
mander. A little later in the season, an equally bold exploit was performed 
on Rhode Island. On a dark night in July [July 10], Colonel William Bar- 
ton, with a company of picked men, crossed Narraganset Bay in whale-boats, 
in the midst of the British fleet, stole cautiously to the quarters of General 
Prescott,' the British commander on Rhode Island, seized him while in bed, 
and carried him in triumph across the bay to Warwick. There a carriage was 
in waiting for him, and at sunrise he was under a strong guard at Providence. 
From thence he was sent to the headquarters of Washington, at Middlebrook, 
on the Raritan," and was exchanged, in April, the next year, for General 
Charles Lee.^ For Colonel Barton's bravery, on that occasion, Congress voted 
hiai an elegant sword, and he was promoted to the rank and pay of a colonel 
in the continental army. 

The American commander-in-chief continued his head quarters at Morris- 
town until near the last of May. During the spring he had inoculated a large 
portion of his troops for the small-pox ;* and when the leaves put forth, a fiir 
degree of health prevailed in his camp, and his army had increased by recruits, 
to almost ten thousand men. He was prepared for action, ofiensive and defens- 
ive ; but the movements of the British perplexed him. Burgoyne was assem- 
bling an army at St. John, on the Sorel,'^ and vicinity, preparatory to an 
invasion of New York, by way of Lake Champlain, to achieve that darling 
object of the British ministry, the occupation of the country on the Hudson." 



' Paee 240. Preppotfs quarters were at a house yet standing in 1870, a short difitance above 
Newport, and about a mile from the bay. 

"^ Wliile on his way, his escort stopped at Lebanon, Connecticut, to dine. Prescott was a 
II Tos^, haughty, and violent-tempered man. At the table, a dish of succotash (beans and corn) 
\- i< bi-()ua;ht to him. Not being accustomed to such food, he regarded it as an insult, and taking 
1 ■ dish from the hands of the liostess, he strewed its contents upon the floor. Her husband being 
u bi-ned of it, flogged the general severely, with a horsewhip. 
' Note 4, page 248 ; also page 288. 

* Tho common practice of vaccination at the present day was then unknown in this country. 
Indeed, the attention of .Jenner, the father of the practice, had then just been turned to the subject 
2t was practiced here a year after the close of the war. * Page 240. ° Pao-e 283. 



272 THE REVOLUTION. [1777- 

But whether Howe was preparing to co-operate with Burgojne, or to make 
another attempt to seize Philadelphia/ Washington could not determine. He 
prepared for both events by stationing Arnold with a strong detachment on the 
west side of the Delaware, concentrating a large force on the Hudson, and 
moving the main body of his army to Middlebrook, within ten miles of the 
British camp at New Brunswick. 

Washington was not kept in suspense a great while. On the 12th of June 
[1777J, Howe passed over from New York, where he made his head quarters 
during the winter, concentrated the main body of his army at New Brunswick, 
and tried to draw Washington into an engagement by a feigned movement [June 
14] toward the Delaware. The chief, perceiving the meaning of this movement, 
and aware of his comparative strength, wisely remained in his strong position 
at Middlebrook until Howe suddenly retreated [June 19], sent some of his 
troops over to Staten Island [June 22], and appeared to be evacuating New 
Jersey. This movement perplexed Washington. He was fairly deceived ; and 
ordering strong detachments in pursuit, he advanced several miles in the same 
direction, with his whole army. Howe suddenly changed front [June 25], and 
attempted to gain the rear of the Americans ; but, after Stirling's brigade had 
maintained a severe skirmish with a corps under Cornwallis [June 26], the 
Americans regained their camp without much loss. Five days afterward [June 
30], the whole British army crossed over to Staten Island, and left New Jersey 
in the complete possession of the patriots. 

Washington now watched the movements of his enemy with great anxiety 
and the utmost vigilance. It was evident that some bold stroke was about to be 
attempted by the British. On the 12th of July, Burgoyne, who had been 
moving steadily up Lake Champlain, with a powerful army, consisting of about 
seven thousand British and German troops, and a large body of Canadians and 
Indians, took possession of Crown Point and Ticonderoga," and spread terror 
over the whole North. At the same time the British fleet at New York took 
such a position as induced the belief that it was about to pass up the Hudson 
and co-operate with the victorious invader. Finally, Howe left General Clinton 
in command at New York, and embarking on board the fleet with eighteen 
thousand troops [July 23], he sailed for the Delaware. When Washington 
comprehended this movement, he left a strong force on the Hudson, and with 
the main body of his troops pushed forward to Philadelphia. There he was 
saluted by a powerful ally, in the person of a stripling, less than twenty years 
of age. He was a wealthy French nobleman, who, several months before, while 
at a dinner with the Duke of Gloucester, ^ first heard of the struggle of the 
Americans, their Declaration of Independence, and the preparations made to 
crush them. His young soul was fired with aspirations to give them his aid ; 
and quitting the army, he hurried to Paris. Although he had just married 
a young and beautiful girl, and a bright career was opened for him in his own 

' Page 261. " Page 23-4. 

' The duke was the brother of the king of England, and at the time in question, was dining with 
Bome French ofiBcers, in the old town of Mentz, in Germany. 



17'77.] 



THIRD YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



2T3 



country, he left all, and hastened to America in a vessel fitted out at his 
own expense. He offered his services to the Continental 
Congress, and that body gave him the commission [July 
31] of a major-general. Three days afterward [Aug. 3] 
he was introduced to Washington at a public dinner : and 
within less than forty days he was gallantly fighting 
[September 11], as a volunteer, for freedom in America, 
on the banks of the Brandy wine. That young general was 
the Marquis de La Fayette,' whose name is forever 
linked with that of Washington and Liberty. general la fatettk. 

The British fleet, with the army under Sir William Howe,^ did not go up 
the Delaware, as was anticipated, but ascended Chesapeake Bay and at its 
head, near the village of Elkton, in Maryland, the land forces disembarked 
[Aug. 25], and marched toward Philadelphia. Washington had advanced be- 
yond the Brandywine Creek, and took post a few miles from Wilmington. 
Howe's superior force compelled him to fall back to the east side of the Brandy- 

and at Chad's Ford, several 





wme 

miles above Wilmington, he made 
a stand for the defense of Phila- 
delphia. At that point, the Hes- 
ians under Knyphausen' attacked 
the left wing of the Americans 
[Sept. 11, 1777], commanded by 
Washington in person ; while How« 
and Cornwallis, crossing the stream 
several miles above, fell upon the 
American right, under General 
Sullivan, near the Birmingham 
meeting-house.* The contest raged 
fearfully during the whole day. 
At night the shattered and defeated battalions of patriots retreated to 
Chester, and the following day [Sept. 12] to Philadelphia. Many brave men 
were killed or disabled on that sanguinary field. La Fayette was severely 
wounded f and the patriots lost full twelve hundred men, killed, wounded, and 



BATTLE AT THE BRANDYWINE. 



' He was born on the 6th of September, 1757. He married the daughter of the Duke de 
Noailles, a beautiful heiress, at the age of eighteen years. He first landed on the coast of South 
Carolina, in Winyaw Bay, near Georgetown, and made a land journey to Philadelphia. His appli- 
cation was not received at first, by the Continental Congress ; but when his true character and 
designs were known, they gave him a major-general's commission. He was afterward an activa 
patriot in his own country in many perilous scenes. He visited America in 1824-5 [page 453], 
and died in 1334, at the age of seventy-seven years. The Baron de Kalb [page 316] and elevea 
other French and Pohsh officers, came to America in La Fayette's vessel. 

^ After the battle near Brooklyn [page 254], the king conferred the honor of knighthood upoa 
General "William Howe, the commander-in-chief of the British forces in America. The ceremonj 
was performed by several of his officers, at his quarters in the Beekman House, Turtle Bay, Eart 
River. ' Page 259. 

* This was a substantial Quaker meeting-house, situated a few miles from Chad's Ford, on the 
road from Jefferis's Ford (where Howe and Cornwallis crossed) to Wilmington 

' A bullet passed through his leg. He was conveyed to Bethlehem, in Pennsylvania, where 

13 



274 THE REVOLUTIOX. [17:7. 

made prisoners. The British lost almost eight hundred. Washington failed 
of success more on account of false intelligence, bj which he was kept in igno- 
rance of the approach of the British on his left, than by Avant of skill or force.' 

Washington did not remain idle in the Federal capital, but as soon as the 
troops were rested, he crossed the Schuylkill, and proceeded to confront Howe, 
Avho was making slow marches toward Philadelphia. They met [Sept. 16] 
twenty miles west of that city, and some skirmishing ensued ; but a heavy rain 
prevented a general battle, and the Americans Avithdrew toward Reading. 
General Wayne, in the mean Avhile, was hanging upon the rear of the enemy 
with about fifteen hundred men. On the night of the 20th, he Avas surprised 
by a party of British and Hessians, under General Grey, near the Paoli Tav- 
ern, and lost about three hundred of his party.* With the remainder he joined 
Washington, then near Valley Forge, and vigilantly, watching the movements 
of Howe. As these indicated the intention of the British commander to attempt 
the seizure of a largo quantity of ammunition and military stores Avhich the 
Americans had collected at Reading, Washington abandoned Philadelphia, and 
took position at PottsgroA'e, thirty-five miles distant, to protect those indispens- 
able materials for his army. HoAve crossed the Schuylkill [Sept. 23, 1777], 
near NorristoAvn, and marched to the Federal city^* [Sept. 26 J, without oppo- 
sition. Congress fled at his approach, first to Lancaster [Sept. 27], and then to 
York, Avherc it assembled on the 30th, and continued its session until the fol- 
lowing summer. The main body of the British army was encamped at Ger- 
mantOAvn, four miles from Philadelphia, and Howe prepared to make the latter 
place his Avniter quarters.* 

Upon opposite sides of the Delaware, a fcAV miles below Philadelphia, were 
two forts of considerable strength (Mifflin and Mercer), garrisoned by the 
Americans. While the British army was marching from the Chesapeake^ to 
Philadelphia, the fleet had sailed around to the DelaAvare, and had approached 
to the head of that bay. The forts commanded the river ; and chevaiix-de- 
frise^ just below them, completely obstructed it, so that the army in Philadel- 
phia could obtain no supplies from the fleet. The possession of these forts was 



tlie Moravian sisters nursed him during his confinement. Count Pulaski began his military career 
in the American arm_y, on the field of Brandywine, where he commanded a troop of horse, and 
after the battle he was appointed to the rank of Brigadier. He was slain at Savannah. See note 
3, page 350. 

' The building seen in the comer of the map, is a view of the head quarters of "Washington, yet 
[1881] standing, a short distance from Chad's Ford. 

^ The bodies of fifty-three Americans, found on the field the next morning, were 
interred in one broad grave ; and forty years afterward, the " Eepublican Artillerists" 
of Chester count}^, erected a neat marble monument over them. It stands in the 
center of an inclosure which contains the ground consecrated by the burial of these 
patriots. 

^ Philadelphia, New York, and "Washington, have been, respectively, federal 
cities, or cities where the Federal Congress of the United States assembled. 

* Note 2, page 285. " Page 273. 

* Chevaux-de-frise are obstructions placed in river channels to prevent the pass- 
age of vessels. They are generally made of a series of heavy timbers, pointed with 
iron, and seciired at an angle in a strong fi-ame filled with stones, as seen in the 
engraving. Figure A shows the position under water; figure B shows how the tim- 
bers ure arranged and the stones placed in them. 





.1777.] THIRD YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 275 

important, and on the 22d of October, they were attached by detachments sent 
by Howe. Fort Mercer was assailed by two thousand Hessian grenadiers under 
Count Donop.' They were repulsed by the garrison of less than five hundred 
men, under Lieutenant- Colonel Christopher Greene, of Rhode Island, after los- 
ing their commander,^ and almost four hundred soldiers. The garrison of Fort 
Mifflin, under Lieutenant-Colonel Samuel Smith, also made a gallant defense, 
but after a series of assaults by land and water, it was abandoned [Nov. 16, 
1777]. Two days afterward, Fort Mercer was also abandoned, and several 
British ships sailed up to Philadelphia.^ 

When Washington was informed of the weakened 
•condition of the British army, by the detachment of 
these forces to attack the Delaware forts, he resolved 
to assail the camp at Germantown. He had moved 
down the Schuylkill to Skippack Creek [Sept. 25], 
and from that point he marched, silently, on the even- 
ing of the 3d of October [1777], toward the camp 
of the enemy. He reached Chestnut Hill, beyond 
Germantown, at dawn the followina; morning, and the 

' 1 * ^ BATTLE AT GERMANTOWN. 

attack soon commenced near there. After a severe 

battle, which continued almost three hours, the patriots were repulsed, with a 
loss, in killed, wounded, and prisoners, about equal to that at Brandy wine.* 
The British lost only about six hundred. On the 19th, Howe broke up his 
encampment at Germantown, and three weeks afterward, he proceeded to place 
his whole army in winter quarters in Philadelphia. Washington retired to 
his camp on Skippack Creek ; and on the 29th of November, he prepared to 
go into winter quarters at White Marsh, fourteen miles from Philadelphia. 

Let us now turn for a while from these scenes of conflict and disaster in 
which the beloved commander-in-chief was personally engaged, to the consider- 
ation of important events which were transpiring on the waters and banks of 
Lake Champlain and the Hudson River. Burgoyne, with more than ten 
thousand men, invested Ticonderoga on the 2d of July. The fortress was gar- 
risoned by General St. Clair, with only about three thousand men. Upon 



' Page 263. 

" Donop was terribly wounded, and taken to the house of a Quaker near by, where he expired 
three days afterward. He was buried within the fort. A few years ago his bones were disinterred, 
and his skull was taken possession of by a New Jersey physician. 

' In the defense of these forts, the Americans lost about three hundred men, and the enemy 
almost double that number. 

* Washington ielt certain of victory at the beginning of the battle. Just as it commenced, a 
dense fog overspread the country ; and through the inexperience of his troops, great confusion, in 
their movements, was produced. A false rumor caused a panic among the Americans, just as 
the British were about to fall back, and a general retreat and loss of victory was the result. In 
Germantown, a strong stone house is yet [1883] standing, which belonged to Judge Chew. This 
a part of the enemy occupied, and from the windows tired with deadly effect upon the Ameri- 
cans. No blame was attached to Washington for this defeat, when victory seemed easy and certain. 
On the contrary. Congress, on the receipt of Washington's letter, describing the battle, passed a vote 
of thanks to him for his " wise and weU-concerted attack upon the enemy's army near German- 
town;" and "to the ofiBcers and soldiers of the army, for their brave exertions on that occasion." A. 
. medal was also ordered to be struck, and presented to Washington. 




GENERAL ST. CLAIE. 



276 THE REVOLUTION. [IttT. 

Mount Independence, on the opposite side of the lake, was a small fortifica- 
tion and a weak garrison.' These composed the entire- 
force, except some feeble detachments of militia, to op- 
pose the invaders. On the approach of Burgoyne, St. 
Clair' left his outworks, gathered his forces near the- 
fortress, and prepared for an assault ; but when, on the 
evening of the 5th, he saw the scarlet uniforms of the- 
British on the top of Mount Defiance,^ and a battery of 
heavy guns planted there, ^ more than five hundred feet 
above the fort, he knew resistance would be vain. That 
evening he sent his ammunition and stores up the lake 
to Skenesborough,^ and under cover of the darkness, silently crossed over to 
Mount Independence, and commenced a retreat to Fort Edward," the head- 
quarters of General Schuyler, who was then in command of the northern army. 
The retreating army would have been beyond the reach of pursuers by 
dawn, had not their exit been discovered. Contrary to express orders, a build- 
ing was fired on Mount Independence, and by its light their flight was discov- 
ered by the enemy, and a strong party, consisting of the brigade of General 
Eraser, and two Hessian corps under Riedesel, was immediately sent in pursuit. 
At dawn, the British flag was waving over Ticonderoga ; and a little after sun- 
rise [July 7, 1777], the rear division of the flying Americans, under Colonel 
Seth Warner,^ were overtaken in Hubbardton, Vermont, and a severe engage- 
ment followed. The patriots were defeated and dispersed, and the victors 
returned to Ticonderoga.^ Before sunset the same evening, a flotilla of British 
vessels had overtaken and destroyed the Americans' stores which St. Clair had 
sent up the lake, and also a large quantity at Skenesborough. The fragments 
of St. Clair's army reached Fort EdAvard on the 12th, thoroughly dispirited. 
Disaster had followed disaster in quick succession. Within a week, the Amer- 
icans had lost almost two hundred pieces of artillery, and a large amount of 
provisions and military stores. 

^ During the previous years, the Americans constructed a picketed fort, or stockade [note 2, 
page 183], on that eminence, built about three hundred huts or barracks, dug several wells, and 
placed batteries at different points. The remains of these are now [1883] everywhere visible ou 
Mount Independence. That eminence received this name because the troops took possession of it 
on the 4th of July, 1176. Page 250. 

" Arthur St. Clair was a native of Scotland, and came to America with Admiral Boscawen, early 
in May, 1755. He served under Wolfe [page 201]; and when the Revolution broke out, lie en- 
tered the American army. He served during the war, and afterward commanded an expedition 
against the Indians in Ohio, where he was unsuccessful. He died in 1818, al the age of eighty-four 
years. 

' This is a hiU about 750 feet in height, situated on the south-west side of the outlet of Lake 
George, opposite Ticonderoga. 

* With immense labor, ]3urgoyne opened a road up the northern slope of Mount Defiance, and 
dragged heavy artillery to the summit. From that point, every ball might be hurled within the 
fort below without difficulty. The position of that road may yet [1883] be traced by the second 
growth of trees on its line up the mountain. 

' Now Whitehall. It was named after Philip Skene, who settled there in 1764. The narrow 
part of Lake Champlain, from Ticonderoga to Whitehall, was formerly called Wood Creek (the name 
of the stream that enters the lake at Whitehall), and also South River. " Page 188. ' Page 232. 

* The Americans lost, in killed, wounded, and missing, a little more than three hundred; the. 
British reported their loss at one hundred and eighty-three. 



1771] THIRD YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 277 

The force under General Schuyler was very small, and even with this rein- 
forcement bj the fugitives from the lake, he had only about four thousand effect- 
ive men — a number totally inadequate to combat with those of Burgoyne. He 
therefore sent a strong party toward Skenesborough to fell huge trees across 
the roads, and to destroy all the bridges, so as to obstruct the march of the 
invaders, while he slowly retreated down the Hudson valley to the mouth of the 
Mohawk, and there established a fortified camp.' His call for aid was nobly 
responded to, for the whole country was thoroughly aroused to a sense of peril. 
Detachments were sent from the regular army to strengthen him ; and soon 
"General Lincoln came with a large body of New England militia. When 
General Gates arrived, to take the chief command,* he found an army of thir- 
teen thousand men, ready to meet the invader. 

The progress of Burgoyne was slow, and he did not reach Fort Edward 
until the 30th of July.^ The obstructions ordered by Schuyler, and the de- 
struction of the bridges, were great hinderances.* His army was also worn down 
hj fatigue, and his provisions were almost exhausted. To replenish his stores, 
lie sent five hundred Germans, Canadians, and Tories, and one hundred Indians, 
under Colonel Baume, to seize provisions and cattle which the Americans had 
collected at Bennington, thirty-five miles distant. Colonel John Stark had 
called out the New Hampshire militia ;. and near Hoosick, within five miles of 
Bennington, they met [Aug. 16] and defeated the marauders. And toward 
evening, when another German party, under Colonel Breyman, approached, 
they also were defeated by a continental force under Colonel Seth Warner.* 
Many of the enemy were killed, and a large number were made prisoners. Bur- 
goyne's entire loss, in this expedition, was almost a thousand men. The Amer- 
icans had one hundred killed, and as many wounded. This defeat Avas fatal to 
Burgoyne' s future operations^ — this victory was a day-star of hope to the 




* Thaddeus Kosciuszko, a Polish refugee, who came with Lafay- 
ette [page 273], was now attached to Schuyler's army, as engineer. 
Under his direction, the intrenchments at the mouth of the Mohawk 
River, were constructed ; also, those at Stillwater and Saratoga. The 
camp at the mouth of the Mohawk was upon islands just below the 
Great, or Cohoes' Falls. 

^ General Schuyler had superseded Gates in June, and had been 
skillfully confronting Burgoyne. But Gates, seeing a chance for gain- 
ing laurels, and having a strong .party of friends in Congress, sought 
the chief command of the northern army. It was ungenerously taken 
from Schuyler at the moment when, by great exertions and through 
great hardships, he had a force prepared to confront Burgoyne, with 
some prospect of success. 

^ It was while Burgoyne wag approaching that point, that Jane KOSca szko 

M'Crea, the betrothed of a young Tory in the British army, was shot, 

while being conveyed by a party of Indians from Fort Edward to the British camp. Her death was 
untruly charged upon the Indians, and it was made the subject of the most bitter denunciations of the 
British ministers, for employing such cruel instrumentalities. The place of her death is a short dis- 
tance from the village of Fort Edward. The pine-tree which marked the spot, decayed a few years 
since, and in 1853, it was cut down, and converted into canes and boxes for the curious. 

* Burgoyne was obliged to construct forty bridges on the way, and to remove the many trees 
which lay across the roads. To estimate the amount of fatigue which the troops must have endured 
during that hot month, it must be remembered that each soldier bore a weight of sixty pounds, in 
.arms, accoutrements, and supplies. ® Pages 234 and 240. 

" It dispirited his troops, who were worn down with the fatigue of the obstructed march from 
^Skenesborough to Fort Edward. It also caused a delay of a month at that place, and in the mean 



278 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1777. 




Americans. Applause of the New Hampshire militia rang through the land, 

and Stark was made a brigadier in the continental army. 

During Burgoyne's approach, the Mohawk valley had become a scene of 
^ ^ great confusion and alarm. Colonel St. Leger and his 

savages, joined by the Mohawk Indians, under Brant,' 
and a body of Tories, under Johnson' and Butler, had 
arrived from Oswego, and invested Fort Stanwix, on 
the 8d of August [1777]. The garrison was com- 
manded by Colonel Gansevoort, and made a spirited 
defense. General Herkimer rallied the militia of his 
neighborhood ; and while marching to the assistance of 
Gansevoort, he fell into an Indian ambuscade [Aug. 6] 
at Oriskany.' His party was totally defeated, after a 
bloody conflict, and himself was mortally wounded. On 
the same day, a corps of the garrison, under Colonel 

Willet, made a successful sortie,* and broke the power of the besiegers. 

Arnold, who had been sent by Schuyler to the relief of the fort, soon afterward 

approached, when the besiegers fled [Aug. 22], and quiet was restored to thb 

Mohawk valley. 

The disastrous events at Bennington and Fort Stan- ,ii='^°^^ 

wix, and the straitened condition of his commissariat, 

greatly perplexed Burgoyne. To retreat, advance, or 

remain inactive, seemed equally perilous. With little 

hope of reaching Albany, where he had boasted he would 

eat his Christmas dinher, he crossed the Hudson and 

formed a fortified camp on the hills and plains of Sara- 
toga, now the site of Schuylerville. General Gates 

advanced to Bemis's Heights, about four miles north of 



JOSEPH BRANT. 



4r ' 




GENERAL BURGOYNE. 



while their provisions were rapidly diminishing. "While at Fort Edward, Burgojno received intel- 
Kgence of the defeat of St. Leger at Fort Stanwix. 

' Joseph Brant was a Mohawk Indian, and a great favorite of Sir William Johnson. He ad- 
hered to the British, and went to Canada after the war, where he died in 1807, aged sixty-five 
years. 

" Sir "William Johnson [page 190] (then dead) had been a sort of auto- 
crat among the Indians and Tories in the Mohawk valley. He flattered 
the chiefs in various ways, and, through them he obtained almost un- 
bounded influence over the triljes, especially that of the Mohawks. Ho 
was in the habit of giving those chiefs who pleased him, a diploma, certi- 
fying their good character, and faithfulness to liis majesty. These con- 
tained a picture, representing a treaty councO, of which the annexed 
engraving is a copy. His family were the worst enemies of the Ameri- 
cans during the war, in that region. His son, John, raised a regiment of 
Tories, called the Johnson Greens (those who joined St. Leger) ; and John. 
Butler, a cruel leader, was at the head of another band, called Butler's Bangers. The'^e co-operated 
•with Brant, the great Mohawk sachem, and for years they made the Mohawk valley and vicinity 
truly a "dark and bloody ground." These men were the allies of St. Leger on the occasion in 
question. 

^ The place of the battle is about halfway between Utica and Rome. The latter village is upon 
the site of Fort Stanwix, built by Bradstreet and his troops in 1758 [page 197]. It was repaired 
find garrisoned in 1776, and its name was changed to Fort Schuyler. Another Fort Schuyler was 
buUt during the French and Indian War, where Utica now stands. 
* Note 7, page 241. 




A TREATY. 



<r-^'^ 




BUBGOYNE SUERENDERINtt HIS SwORD TO GATES. 



1777.] 



THIRD YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



281 



Stillwater (and twenty-five from Albany), and also formed a fortified camp.' 
Burgoyne perceived the necessity for immediate operations, and advancing toward 
the American camp, a severe but indecisive action 
ensued, on the 19th of September [1777J. Night 
terminated the conflict, and both parties claimed the 
victory.' Burgoyne fell back to his camp, where he 
resolved to await the arrival of expected detach- 
ments from General Clinton, who was to attack the 
posts on the Hudson Higlilands, and force his Avay to 
Albany.' But after waiting a few days, and hearing 
nothing from Clinton, he prepared for another at- 
tempt upon the Americans, for the militia were flock- 
ing to Gates's camp, and Indian Avarriors of the Six 
Nations^ were gathering there. His OAvn force, on 
the contrary, was hourly diminishing. As his star, which arose so brightly at 
Ticonderoga,5 began to decline upon the Hudson, the Canadians and his Indian 
allies deserted him in great numbers." He was compelled to fight or flee. 
Again he advanced ; and after a severe battle of several hours, on the 7th of 
October, and almost on the same ground occupied on the 19th of September, he 
was compelled to fall back to the heights of Saratoga, and leave the patriots in 
the possession of the field. Ten days afterward [October 17], finding only 
three days' provisions in his camp, hearing nothing of Clinton, and perceiving 
retreat impossible, he Avas compelled to surrender his whole army prisoners of 
war.'' Of necessity, the forts upon Lake Champlain now fell into the hands of 
the patriots. 




BEMIS'S HEIGHTS. 



* The remains of some of the intrenchments were yet visible in 1850, when the writer visitecj 
the locality. 

* The number of Americans engaged in this action, was about two thousand five hundred ; that 
of the British was about three thousand. The former lost, in killed, wounded, and missing, three 
hundred and nineteen; the British loss was rather less than five hundred. ^ Page 283. 

* Page 25. ^ Page 276. 

® The Indians had been disappointed in their expectations of blood and plunder ; and now was 
their hunting season, when provisions must be secured for winter use. The Canadians saw nothing 
but defeat in the future, and left the army in whole companies. 

' The whole number surrendered was five thousand seven hundred and ninety-one, of whom 
two thousand four hundred and twelve were Germans or Hessians [page 183], under the chief com- 
mand of the Baron Riedesel, whose wife accompanied him, and afterward wrote a very interesting 
account of her experience in America. Burg03'ne did dine at Albany, but as a prisoner, though a 
guest at the table of General Schuyler. Tliat noble patriot, though smarting under the injustice of 
Congress and the pride of Gates, did not abate liis zeal for the good cause when he had surrendered 
his comiiaand into the hands of his successor, but, as a private citizen, gave his time, his labor, and 
his money freely, until he saw the invader humbled ; and then, notwithstanding Burgoyne, without 
the sliow of a just excuse, had destroyed Schuyler's fine mansion, his mills, and much other prop- 
erty, at Saratoga, he made the vanquished general a guest at his own table. When Burgo^me said, 
"You are very kind to one who has done you so much injury," the generous patriot replied, "That 
was the fate of war ; let us say no more about it." Burgoyne's troops laid down tlieir arras upon 
the plain in front of Schuylerville ; and the meeting of the conqueror and the conquered, for the 
latter to surrender his sword, was a very significant scene. The two came out of Gates's marquee 
together. Without exchanging a word, Burgoyne, according to previous arrangement, stepped 
back, drew his sword, and, in the presence of the two armies, presented it to General Gates. The 
latter received it with a courteous inclination of the liead, and instantly returned it to the vanquished 
general. They then returned to the marquee together. The British filed off, and took up their line 
of march for Boston : and thus ended tliis important act in the great drama, upon the lieights of 
Saratoga. Burgoyne's troops were marched to Cambridge, Massachusetts, with the view of senduig 



282 THE REVOLUTION. [1777. 

Glorious, indeed, was this victory for the Americans. It gave them a fine 
train of brass artillery, five thousand muskets, and a vast amount of munitions 
of war. Its moral eflFect was of greater importance. All eyes had been 
anxiously turned to the army of the North, and Congress and the people 
listened eagerly for every breath of rumor from Saratoga. How electric was 
the efiect when a shout of victory came from the camp of Gates ! " It rolled 
over the land, and was echoed from furrows, workshops, marts of commerce, 
the halls of legislation, and from the shattered army of Washington at White- 
marsh.' Toryism stood abashed ; the bills of Congress rose twenty per cent, in 
value ;' private capital came from its hiding-places for public employment ; the 
militia flocked to the standards of leaders, and the great patriot heart of Amer- 
ica beat with strong pulsations of hope. The effect in Europe was also favor- 
able to the Americans. The highest hopes of the British ministry rested on 
this expedition, and the generalship of Burgoyne justified their expectations. 
It was a most severe blow, and gave the opposition in Parliament the keenest 
weapons. Pitt, leaning upon his crutches,* poured forth eloquent denunciations 
[December, 1777] of the mode of Avarfare pursued — the employment of German 
hirelings^ and brutal savages.*^ "If I were an American, as I am an English- 
man," he exclaimed, " while a foreign troop was landed in my country, I never 
would lay down my arms — never, never, never !" In the Lower House, ^ 
Burke, Fox, and Barre were equally severe upon the government. When, on 
the 3d of December, the news of Burgoyne's defeat reached London, the latter 
arose in his place in the Commons,* and with a serene and solemn countenance, 
asked Lord George Germain, the Secretary of War, what news he had received 
by his last expresses from Quebec, and to say, upon his word of honor, what 
had become of Burgoyne and his brave army. The haughty secretary was 
irritated by the cool irony of the question, but was compelled to acknowledge 
that the unhappy intelligence of Burgoyne's surrender had reached him. He 
added, " The intelligence needs confirmation." That confirmation was not 
slow in reaching the ministry. 

Mightily did this victory weigh in favor of the Americans, at the French 



them to Europe, but Congress thought it proper to retain them, and they were marched to the 
interior of Virginia. Jolm Burgoyne was a natural son of Lord Biugley, and was quite eminent as 
a dramatic autlior. On liis return to England, he resumed his seat as a member of Parliament, and 
opposed tlie war. He died in 1792. 

' General Gates was so elated with the victory, whicli had been prepared for him by General 
Schuyler, and won chiefly by the valor of Arnold and Morgan [page 331], that he neglected the 
courtesy due to the commauder-in-cluef, and instead of sending liis dispatches to him, he sent his 
aid, Colonel Wilkinson, with a verbal message to Congress. That body also forgot its dignity in 
the hour of its joy. and the young officer was allowed to announce the victory liimself, on the floor 
of Congress. In his subsequent dispatches. Gates did not even mention the names of Arnold and 
Morgan. History has vindicated their claims to the honor of the victory, and placed a just estimate 
upon the ungenerous conduct of tlieir commander. Congress voted a gold medal to Gates. 

" Page 275. ' Note 3, page 245. ■* Note 1, page 231. * Note 3, page 246. 

® A member justified the employment of the Indians, by saying that the British had a right to 
use the means "which God and nature had given them." Pitt scornfully repeated the passage, and 
said, "These abominable principles, and this most abominable avowal of them, demands most 
decisive indignation. I call upon that right reverend bench (pointing to the bishops), those holy 
ministers of the gospel, and pious pastors of the church — I conjure them to join in the holy work^ 
and to vindicate the religion of their God." ' Note 2, page 218. * Note 2, page 218. 



1777.] THIRD YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 283 

court. Unaided by any foreign power, the Americans had defeated and cap- 
tured a well -trained army of about six thousand men, led by experienced com- 
manders. " Surely such a people possess the elements of success, and will achieve 
it. We may now safely strike England a severe blow,' by acknowledging the 
.independence, and forming an alliance with her revolted colonies," argued the 
French government. And so it did. Intelligence of the surrender of Bur- 
goyne reached Paris on the 4th of December, 1777. King Louis then cast off all 
disguise, and informed the American commissioners that the treaty of alliance 
and commerce, already negotiated, would be ratified, and "that it was decided 
to acknowledge the independence of the United States." Within a little more 
than a hundred days after Burgoyne laid down his arms at Saratoga, France 
had formed an alliance with the confederated States [Feb. 6, 1778], and pub- 
licly avowed it. The French king, in the mean while, Avrote to his uncle, the 
king of Spain, urging his co-operation ; for, according to the family compact 
of the Bourbons, made in 1761, the king of Spain was to be consulted before 
such a treaty could be ratified. 

While these events were in progress at Saratoga, General Clinton was 
making hostile demonstrations upon the banks of the lower Hudson. He 
attempted the concerted co-operation with Burgoyne, but he was too late for 
success. He ascended the Hudson with a strong force, captured Forts Clinton 
and Montgomery, in the Highlands'" [October 6, 1777], and sent a marauding 
expedition above these mountain barriers, to devastate the country [October 
13], and endeavor to draw off some of the patriot troops from Saratoga.^ These 
marauders burned Kingston, and penetrated as far as Livingston's Manor, in 
Columbia county. Informed of the surrender of Burgoyne, they hastily 
retreated, and Clinton and his army returned to New York. Some of Gates' 
troops now joined Washington at White Marsh,' and Howe made several 
attempts to entice the chief from his encampment, but without success." Finally 

^ France rejoiced at the embarrassments of England, on account of her revolted colonies, and 
from the beginning secretly favored the latter. She thought it inexpedient to aid the colonies 
openly, until there appeared some chance for their success, j'et arms and monej'' were secretly pro- 
vided [note 3, page 266], for a long time previous to the alliance. Her motives were not the 
benevolent ones to aid the patriots, so much as a selfish desire to injure England for her own bene- 
fit. The French king, in a letter to his uncle, of Spain, avowed the objects to be to " prevent the 
union of the colonies with the mother country," and to " form a beneficial alliance with them." A 
Bourbon (the iamily of French kings) was never known to be an honest advocate of free principles. 

" These forts were situated on opposite sides of a stream which forms the dividing line 
between Orange and Rockland counties. Fort Indpendence, near Peekskill, and Fort Constitution, 
opposite West Point, were abandoned on his approach. Fort Putnam, at West Point, was not yet 
erected. 

* While the garrison of the two forts (who escaped) were re-gathering, back of New Windsor, a 
man from the British army was arrested on suspicion of being a spy. He was seen to swallow 
something. An emetic brouorht it up, and it was discovered to be a hollow silver bullet, containing 
a dispatch from Clinton to Burgoyne, WTitten on thin paper. That bullet is yet in the family of 
George Clinton, who was the first republican governor of New York. The dispatch was as 
follows: ^' Nbu.s y void [Here we are], and nothing between us and Gates. I sincerely hope thi3 
little success of ours will facilitate your operations. In answer to your letter of the 28th of Sep- 
tember, by C. C, I shall only say, I can not presume to order, or even advise, for reasons obvious. 
I heartily wish you success. Faithfully yours, H. Clintox." The prisoner was taken to Kingston, 
and there hanged as a spy. * Page 275. 

* Howe marched out to attack Washington on the 4th of December, expecting to take him by 
surprise. A Quaker lady of Philadelphia, at whose house some British officers were quartered, had 



^84 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[Ills. 



Washington moved from that position [December 11], and went into winter 
quarters at Valley Forge, where he might easier aflford protection to Congress 
at York, and his stores at Reading.' The events of that encampment at Valley 
Forge afford some of the gloomiest as well as some of the most brilliant scenes 
in the records of American patriotism. 



CHAPTER V. 

FOURTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. [1778.] 

If there is a spot on the face of our broad land wherein patriotism should 
delight to pile its highest and most venerated monument, it should be in the 
bosom of that rugged gorge on the bank of the Schuylkill, twenty miles north- 




west from Philadelphia, known as Valley Forge, where the American army- 
was encamped during the terrible winter of 1 777-' 78.' In all the world's his- 



overheard them talking about this enterprise, gave "Washington timely information, and he was too 
well prepared for Howe, to fear his menaces. After some skirmishes, in which several Americana 
were lost, Howe returned to Philadelphia. ' Page 274. 

* That was a winter of severe and protracted cold. The waters of New York Bay were so 
firmly frozen, that the British took heavy cannons from the city to Staten Island, on the ice. 



1778.] FOURTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE, 



285 



tory, we have no record of purer devotion, holier sincerity, or more pious self- 
immolation, than *was then and there exhibited in the camp of Washington, 
Many of the soldiers had marched thither from Whitemarsh, bare-footed, and 
left bloody foot-prints in the snow on their dreary 
journey.' There, in the midst of frost and snow, half- 
clad and scantily fed, they shivered in rude huts, 
while the British army was indulging in comforts and 
luxuries within a large city.^ Yet that freezing and 
starving army did not despair ; nor did the com- 
mander-in-chief, who shared their privations and suf- 
fered injury at the hands of intriguing men,^ lose con- 
fidence in the patriotism of the people or his troops, 
or doubt the wisdom of Providence.^ The winter wore 
away, and when the buds began to burst, a cheering 
ray of glad tidings came from Europe. The intelli- 
gence of the treaty of alliance with France,^ was a 
hopeful assurance of success, and when the news 
spread through the camp, on the 1st of May [1778], 
shouts loud and long shook the forests which shrouded the hills around Valley 
Forge. « 

Nor was that a solitary gleam of hope. Light also -emanated from the 




ENCAMPMENT AT VALLEY FOEGE- 



^ ' Gordon, the historian, says, that while at "Washington's table ia 1784, the chief informed him 
'that bloody foot-prints were everywhere visible in the course of their march of nineteen miles, from 
Whitemarsh to Valley Forge. 

* The power of t' e British army was much weakened by indulgence, during that winter. Prof- 
ligacy begat disease, jrime, and insubordination. The evil eft'ects produced upon the army led Dr. 
Franklin to say, " Howe did^not take Pliiladelphia — Philadelphia took Howe." General Howe took 
leave of the army in May, and the officers gave him a splendid farewell /efe, which was called a 
Mischianza, signifying a medley. For a full description, see Lossing's Field Book of the Revolution. 
During their occupation of the city, the enemy were annoyed by the patriots in various ways. In 
January, some Whigs at Bordentown, where Francis Hopkinson, one of the signers of the Declara- 
tion of Independence, resided, sent a number of kegs down the Delaware, which were filled with 
powder, and furnished with machinery, in such a manner, that on rubbing against any object in the 

1, they would explode. These were the torpedoes invented by Bushnell of Connecticut, 
mentioned on page 252. The British vessels, hauled into the docks to keep clear of the ice, 
escaped receiving any injury from these missiles. One of them exploded near the citj'-, and pro- 
duced intense alarm. Not a stick or a chip was seen floating, for twenty-four hours afterward, but 
it was fired at by the British. This circumstance afforded the theme for that remarkable poem from 
the pen of Hopkinsoh, entitled Tlte Battle of the Kegs. Hopkinson [see page 284] was a native of 
Philadelphia and married and settled in Bordentown, New Jersey. He was an elegant writer, a 
great wit, a good musician, and a thorough-bred gentleman. He was a warm and active patriot, 
liecame eminent as a jurist after the war. and died in 1791, at the age of forty-seven years. HI.t 
son, Joseph Hopkinson, was the author of our national song, Hail Columbia. 

^ Durmg this season a scheme was formed among a few officers of the army, and members of 
Congress, for depriving Washington of his command, and giving it to Gates or Lee. Both of these 
ambitious men sought the honor, and the former was fully identified with the clandestine move- 
ments toward that end. One of the chief actore in the plot, who was more the instrument of others 
than a voluntary and independent schemer, was General Conway, an Irishman, who belonged to the 
continental army, ^he plot was discovered and defeated, and Conway was led to make a most 
humble apology to Washington, for his conduct. 

* On one occasion, Isaac Potts, whose house was Washington's head-quarters at Valley Forge, 
discovered the chief in a retired place, pouring out his soul in prayer to his God. Potts went home 
to his wife, and said, with tears in his eyes, " If there is any one on this earth to whom the Lord 
will listen, it is George Washington " ^ Page 28.3. 

' On the 7th day of May the army fired salutes in honor of the event, and by direction of the 
chie^ they all shouted, "■ Huzza for the king of Prance!" 



286 THE REVOLUTION. [177a 

British throne and Parliament. The capture of Burgoyne, and the general 
failure of the campaign of 1777, had made the English peojskle, and a powerful 
minority in Parliament, clamorous for peace and reconciliation. Lord North, 
the prime-minister,' -was compelled to listen. To the astonishment of every 
body, he proposed [Feb. 17J a repeal of all the acts of Parliament obnoxious to 
the Americans, which had been enacted since 1763 ; and in the course of his 
speech in favor of his conciliatory plan, he actually proposed to treat the Con- 
tinental Congress as a legal body.'' Two bills, expressing these conciliatory 
measures, were passed after much opposition,^ and received the signature of the 
king, on the 11th of March. Commissioners* were appointed to proceed to 
America to negotiate for peace with Congress, and the British government 
seemed really anxious to offer the olive branch, without qualification. But the 
Americans had been too often deceived to accept any thing confidingly from that 
source, and as soon as these bills reached Congress [April 15], and it was found 
that they made no mention of the independence of the colonies, that body at 
once rejected them as deceptive. When the commissioners came [June 4], 
Congress refused to negotiate with them until Great Britain should withdraw 
her fleets and armies, or unequivocally acknowledge the independence of the 
United States. After unsuccessfully appealing to the American people, and 
one of them endeavoring to bribe members of Congress,'^ the commissioners 
retuiTied to England, and the war Avent on. 

The alliance with France gave the patriots greater confidence in their ulti- 
mate success. It was immediately productive of action. The first movement 
of the French government, in compliance with the requirements of that treaty, 
was to dispatch a squadron, consisting of twelve ships of the line, and four 
large frigates, under Count D'Estaing, to blockade the British fleet in the Del- 
aware. When, a month before ho sailed, the British ministry was officially 
informed [March 17, 1778] of the treaty, and it was considered equivalent to a 
declaration of war, a vessel was dispatched with a message to the British com- 
manders, ordering them *to evacuate Philadelphia and the Delaware, and to con- 
centrate their forces at New York. Fortunately for Lord Howe, he had left 

' Page 224. * Note 2, page 253. 

* Pitt was favorable to these bills, but when a proposition was made to acknowledge the independ- 
ence of the colonies, and thus dismember the British empire, he opposed the measure with all his 
might. He was in favor of reconciliation, not of separation. It was during his speech on this sub- 
ject, that he was seized [April 7] with the illness which terminated his life a month afterward. 
Pitt was born in November, 1708, and died on the 11th of May, 1778, when almost seventy years 
of age. 

■" The Earl of Carlisle, George Johnstone, formerly governor of Florida, and William Eden, 
a brother of Sir Robert Eden, the last royal governor of Maryland. Adam Ferguson, the eminent 
professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Edinburg, accompanied them as secretary. 

^ Among those who were approaclied was General Joseph Reed, a delegate from Pennsyl- 
va:iia. Mrs. Ferguson, wife of a relative to the secretary of the commissioners, then residing in 
Philadelphia, and who was intimate with Mr. Reed, was employed to sound him. Mr. Reed had 
been suspected by some of his compatriots of rather easy virtue as a republican, and the fact that 
he was approachable in this way, conhrmed their suspicions. Mrs. Ferguson was authorized to 
offer him high official station and a large sum of money, if he would use his influence in favor of 
peace, according to the submissive terms offered by the commissioners. Her mission became 
known, and General Reed alleged that he said to her, "I am not worth purchasing; but such as I 
am, the king of England is not rich enough to do it." 




1778.] FOURTH YEAR OF THE "WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE, 287 

the Delaware a few days before the arrival of D'Estaing' [Julj 8, 1778], and 
found safety in the waters of Amboj or Raritan Bay, into which the heavy 
French vessels could not enter over the bar that stretches northward from 
Sandy Hook toward the Narrows. A little earlier than this, there had been a 
change in the command of the British army. Sir Henry Clinton,' a more effi- 
cient officer than 'Howe, had succeeded him as general- 
in-chief, toward the close of May, and on the 18th of 
Jun3, he withdrew his whole army from Philadelphia. 
With eleven thousand men, and an immense baggage 
and provision train, he started for New York, by the 
way of New Brunswick and Amboy. Washington, sus- 
pecting some important movement, was on the alert, and 
breaking up his encampment at Valley Forge, he pur- 
sued Clinton with more than equal force. ^ By adroit 

r- 1 A • • GENERAL CLINTON. 

movements, detachments oi the American army so inter- 
cepted Clinton's march, as to compel him to change his course in the direction 
of Sandy Hook, while New Jersey militia continually harassed his flanks and 
rear.'' Finally, a general engagement took place [June 28, 1778] on the 
plains of Monmouth, in the present village of Freehold, in New Jersey. 

The 28th of June, 1778, a day memorable in the annals of Freedom, was 
the Christian Sabbath. The sky was cloudless over the plains of Monmouth,^ 
when the morning dawned, and the sun came up with all the fervor of the sum- 
mer solstice. It was the sultriest day of the year — one of the warmest ever 
known. On that calm Sabbath morning, in the midst of paradisal beauty, 
twenty thousand men girded on the implements of hellish war, to maim anc' 
■destroy each other— to sully the green grass and the fragrant flowers with 
human blood. Nature was smiling in her summer garments, and in earth and 
air there was fullness of love and harmony. Man, alone, was the discordant 
iiote in the universal melody. He, alone, the proud "lord of creation," dis- 
tur'ied the chaste worship of the hour, which ascended audibly from the groves, 
the streams, the meadows, and the woodlands. 

The two armies began to prepare for action at about one o'clock in the 
morning, and at day-break they were in motion. Before nine, detachments met 



' Silas Deane [pap^e 266] returned to America in D'Estaing's flag-ship, and Gerard, the first 
French minister to the United States, came in the same vessel. Congress was now in session in 
Philadelphia, having returned from York [page 274] on the 30th of June, twelve days after the 
British had left for New York. 

^ Henry Clinton was a son of George Clinton, governor of the province of New York in 1743, 
and a grandson of the Earl of Lincoln. After the war he was made governor of Gibraltar [1795], 
and died there the same year 

' Arnold was yet quite lame from the effects of a severe wound in the leg, which he received in 
the battle on Berais's Heights [page 278], and at his solicitation, Washington left him in command of 
a corps at Philadelphia, with the powers of a military governor. Washington crossed the Delaware 
in pursuit of Clinton, with a littlemore than 12,000 men. 

* Wasliington was anxious to attack Clinton when he was in the vicinity of Allentown, but Lee 
and others overruled his opinions, in a council of war. ' Greene, La Fayette, and Wayne agreed 
witli the chief, and supported by tliese able officers, he resolved on a general engagement. 

^ The battle of Monmoutli was fought in the immediate vicinity of the present village of Free- 
iiold. New Jersey, chiefly witliin the space of two miles north- west of the town. 



288 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1778. 




BATTLE JIT MONMOUTH. 



in deadly conflict, and from that hour until dark, on that long summer day, the 

terrible contest raged. It waa 
commenced by the advanced division 
of the American army, under Gen- 
eral Charles Lee.' His apparent 
want of skill or courage, and a mis- 
understanding of orders on the 
part of some of his officers, pro- 
duced a general and tumultuous 
retreat of his division. The fugitives were met by the approaching main body, 
under Washington,* and being speedily checked and restored to order by the 
chief, they were led to action, and the battle became general. Many fell under 
the excessive heat of the day, and when night came, both parties were glad to 
rest. The Americans slept on their arms' during the night, with the intention 
of renewing the battle at dawn, but when light appeared, the British camp was 
deserted. Clinton had silently withdrawn [June 29], and w^as far on his way 
toward Sandy Hook.* Washington did not follow, but marching to New 
Brunswick, and thence to the Hudson River, he proceeded to White Plains,* 
where he remained until late in autumn. Then he crossed into New Jersey, 
and made his winter quarters at Middlebrook, on the Raritan, where he was 



' Page 248. This command was first given to La Fayette, but when Lee, who had opposed the 
measure in council, signified his readiness to lead it, it was given to him, as he was the senior 
officer. 

* Washington was greatly irritated when he met the fugitives, and riding up to Lee, he 
addressed him with much warmth of language, and directed him to assist in restoring order. Lee 
promptly obeyed, but the sting of Washington's words rankled in his bosom, and on that day, after 
the battle, he addressed an otlensive letter to the chief. Lee was arrested and tried by a court- 
martial, on the charges of disobedience of orders, misbehavior before the enemy, and disrespect to 
the commander-in-chief. He was found guilty, and was suspended from command for one year. 
He never entered the army again, and died in obscurity, in Philadelphia, in October, 1782. He 
was brave, but bad in manners and morals, profane in language, and a contemner of religion. It is 
believed that he was willing to have Washington lose the battle of Monmouth, because he (Lee), 
was opposed to it, and at the same time was seeking to rise to the chief command upon the ruing, 
of Washington's reputation. We have already alluded to the conspiracy toward that end, on page 
285. Tlie hottest of the battle occurred a short distance from the Freehold Presbyterian Church 
yet [1883] standing. Near it is a board, with an inscription, showing the burial-spot of Colonel 
Monckton, of the British army, who was killed in the battle. 

^ This expression is used respecting troops who sleep with all their accoutrements on, and 
their weapons by their side, ready for action in a moment. The British left about three hundred 
killed on the field of battle. They also left a large number of the sick and wounded to the mercy 
of the Americans. The Americans lost in killed, wounded, and missing, two hundred and twenty- 
eight. Many of the missing afterward rejoined the army. They had less than seventy killed. 

* In his dispatch to the Secretary of War, General Clinton said, "I took advantage of the moon- 
Kght to rejoin General Knyphausen," &c. As, according to an almanac of that year, the moon waa 
quite new, and set two hours before Clinton's march, this boast of leaving in the moonlight occa«- 
sioned much merriment. Trumbull, in his MFingal, alluding to this, says. 



' He forms his camp with great parade, 
While evening spreads the world in shade, 
Then still, like some endanger'd spark. 
Steals off on tiptoe in the dark ; 
Yet writes his king, in boasting tone, 
How grand he march' d by light of moon I 



Go on, great general, nor regard 
The scoflfa of every scribbling bard. 



'Who sings how gods, that fearful night. 
Aided hy miracle your flight ; 
As once they used, in Homer's day. 
To help weak heroes run away ; 
Tells how the hours, at this sad trial. 
Went back, as erst on Ahaz' dial. 
While British Joshua stayed the moon 
On Monmouth's plain for Ajalpn. 
Heed not their sneers or gibes so arch. 
Because she set before your march." 




1778.] FOURTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 289 

encamped in the spring and summer of the previous year.' Clinton's shattered 
forces went on board the British fleet at Sandy Hook, and proceeded to New 
York, where the head quarters of the royal army continued until the close of 
the war.' And when D'Estaing appeared off Sandy Hook, the British fleet was 
safe in Raritan Bay. As we have already mentioned, 
the bar from Sandy Hook to Staten Island would not 
allow the heavy French vessels to pass, and D'Estaing 
therefore relinquished his design of attacking Howe's 
fleet, and on the solicitation of Washington, he proceeded 
to Newport, to assist the Americans in an attempt to 
drive the British from Rhode Island.' General Sullivan 
had been sent to supersede General Spencer in command 
there ; and Washington also dispatched La Fayette, with 
two continental regiments (accompanied by General count d'estaing. 
Greene, then quartermaster general), to aid in the expe- 
dition. John Hancock* came at the head of Massachusetts militia, and similar 
troops gathered at Tiverton, from Connecticut and Rhode Island.^ On the 9ih 
of August, [1778], the whole American force crossed from Tiverton to the north 
end of Rhode Island, and the British guards fled to the camp of General Pigot, 
at Newport. 

Several ships of war came from England at about this time, to reinforce the 
British fleet at New York, and a few days after D'Estaing sailed for Newport, 
a large squadron under Howe, proceeded to the relief of Pigot. It appeared 
off Rhode Island on the same day [Aug. 9] when the Americans landed on the 
northern end of it. D'Estaing, who was then withm the harbor, went out to 
meet Howe, but before they came to an engagement, a terrible storm arose 
[Aug. 12], and scattered and disabled both fleets." The French squadron 
returned to Newport [August 20], and immediately sailed for Boston to be 
repaired. The Americans had then advanced almost to Newport, with every 
prospect of making a successful siege. They had been promised four thousand 
land troops from the French fleet. These -were denied them ; and refusing to 
listen to entreaties or remonstrances, D'Estaing sailed for Boston and abandoned 
the Americans.^ The latter hastily withdrew to the north end of the island 

' Page.272. "^ Page 350. ' Page 261. * Page 231. 

^ The people of Rhode Island had suffered drpadfuUy from the brutality of the British troops. 
There had 'r.een some amelioration of their condition since the capture of Prescott [page 271], and 
under the rule of Pigot, the present commander. When success seemed possible, thousands ol 
volunteers flocked to the standards of Sullivan and La Fayette. John Hancock was appointed a 
general of some of these volunteers. But his term of service was short. Like Dr. Franklin [pag» 
193], Hancock was better fitted for a statesman than a soldier. 

' Very old people on Rhode Island, who remembered this- gale, spoke of it to the writer in 
1850, as "the great storm." So violent was the wind, that it brought spray from the ocean a mile 
distant, and encrusted the windows of the town with salt. 

' This conduct was warmly censured by the American commanders, because it had no vaUd 
excuse. It deprived them of a victory just vrithin their grasp. Congress, however, afraid to offend 
the French, uttered not a word of blame. The matter was passed over, but not forgotten. One© 
again [page 305], the same admiral abandoned the Americans. D'Estamg was a native of 
Auvergne, France. He became involved in the French Revolution, in 1792, and in the spring of 
1793, he was guillotined. The guillotine was an instrument for cutting off the head, invented by 
M. Guillotine, who was eventually beheaded by it himself 

19 



200 THE REVOLUTION. [1778. 

[August 28], pursued by the British, and a severe engagement took place 
[August 29J at Quaker Hill. Sullivan repulsed the British, and on the night 
of the 30th, withdrew his whole army to the main, near Bristol, in time to 
avoid an interception by Sir Henry Clinton, who had just arrived with four 
thousand troops, in light vessels.' The Americans lost in this expedition, thirty 
killed, and one hundred and seventy-two wounded and missing. The British 
loss was about two hundred and twenty. 

While these events were transpiring on the sea-board, a dreadful tragedy 
was enacted in the interior, when the Wyoming, Mohawk, Schoharie, and 
Cherry Valleys, were made the theaters of terrible scenes of blood and devasta- 
tion. Tories from distant Niagara,'- and savages upon the head waters of the 
Susquehanna, gathered at Tioga early in June ; and at the beginning of July, 
eleven hundred of these white and dusky savages, under the general command 
of Colonel John Butler,^ entered [July 2, 1778] the lovely valley of Wyoming, 
in northern Pennsylvania. IMost of the strong men were then away on distant 
duty, and families and homes found defenders only in aged men, tender youths, 
resolute women, and a few trained soldiers. These, about four hundred strong, 
under Colonel Zebulon Butler,* marched up the valley [July 4], to drive back 
the invaders. But tliey were terribly smitten by the foe, and a large portion 
of them were slain or made prisoners. A few escaped to Forty Fort, near 
Wilkesbarre, wherein families, for miles around, had sought safety. Uncertain 
of their fate — for the invaders were sweeping like a dark storm down the Sus- 
quehanna — the night of the battle-day was a terrible one for the people in the 
fort. But their agony of suspense was ended the following morning, when the 
leader of the invaders, contrary to the expectations of those who knew him, 
agreed upon humane terms of surrender.^ The gates of the fort were thrown 
open, and most of the families returned to their homes in fancied security. They 
were doomed to terrible disappointment and woe. Brant, the great Indian 

* "When Clinton was assured of the security of Rliode Island, he detached General Grey on a 
marauding expedition upon the southern shores of ^lassachusetts, and among the adjacent islands, 
and then returned to New York. Grey burned about seventy vessels in Buzzard's Bay, near New 
Bedford, and in that vicinity destroyed property valued at more than three hundred and twenty- 
three thousand dollars. He then went to Martha's Vineyard [page 57], and carried away, for the 
army in New York, about three liundred oxen, and ten thousand sheep. On the first of October, 
Clinton sent a successful expedition to capture American stores at Little Egg Harbor, on the New 
Jersey coast. ^ Page 200. ' Note 2, page 278. 

* Zebulon Butler was a native of Connecticut, and was bom in 1731. He was in the French 
and Indian "War, and was one of the earlier settlers in Wyoming. In 1778 he was appointed 
colonel, and was with Sullivan in his memorable expedition against the Senecas [page 304] the fol- 
lowing year. He was in active service thoughout the war, and died in Wyoming in 1795, at the 
age of sixty-four years. 

^ All our histories contain horrible statements of the fiend-like character of John Butler, and his 
unmitigated wickedness on this occasion. They also speak of the "monster Brant" [page 278] as 
the leader of the Indians, and the instigator of the crimes of which they were guilty. Both of these 
men were bad enough ; but recent investigations clearly demonstrate that Brant was not there at 
all ; and the treaty for surrender, which is still in existance, granted most humane terms to the be- 
sieged, instead of the terrible one reported in our histories. The fugitives who fled over the mount- 
ains, and made their way back to their native Connecticut, crossed the Hudson, many of them at 
Poughkeepsie, where John Holt was publishing a weekly paper. Their fears had magnified events, 
and their tales of terror were published in Holt's journal, and thus became records for future his- 
torians. Among other things, it was related that when the question was asked, on what terms the 
fort, might be surrendered. Colonel John Butler, with more than savage cruelty, replied, The Hatchet 1 
This IS wholly untrue, and yet the story is repeated in all our histories. 



1778.] FOURTH YEAR OF THE "WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. £91 

leader, was not there to restrain his savage bands,* and their thirst for blood 
and plunder soon overcame all their allegiance to their white commander. Be- 
fore sunset they had scattered over the valley ; and when night fell upon the 
scene, the blaze of more than twenty dwellings cast its lurid glare over the, 
paradise of yesterday. The cries of the murdered went up from almost every 
house and field ; and when the moon arose, the terrified inhabitants were fleeing 
to the Wilkesbarre mountains, and the dark morasses of the Pocono beyond. In. 
that vast wilderness between the valley and the Delaware, appropriately called 
the Shades of Death, many women and children, who escaped the hatchet, 
perished by hunger and fatigue. That " Wyoming Massacre," as it has been 
appropriately called, stands out in bold relief as one of the darkest crimes per- 
petrated during the War for Independence. 

In the mean while, Brant' was leading or sending war parties through the 
country south of the MohaAvk River ; and the Johnsons' and their Tory adher- 
ents were allies of the savages in the Mohawk valley. On the 11th and 12th 
of November [1778], a party of Tories, under Walter N. Butler,* accompanied 
by Indians, under Brant, fell like lightning upon the settlement of Cherry Val- 
ley. Many of the people were killed, or carried into captivity ; and for months 
no eye was closed in security at night, within an area of a hundred miles and 
more, around this desolated village. Tryon county, as that region of New 
York was then called, was a " dark and bloody ground" for full four years, and 
the records of the woes of the people have filled volumes.^ Our space allows 
us to mention only the most prominent events of that period. 

And now, when the year 1778 — the fourth year of the war — drew to a 
close, the British army had accomplished very little more in the way of conquest, 
than at the end of the second year. The belligerent forces occupied almost the 
same relative position which they did in the autumn of 1776, while the Amer- 
icans had gained strength by a knowledge of military tactics,* naval operations, 

* The Indians were led by Gi-en-gwa-tah (he who goes in the smoke), a celebrated Seneca 
chief. ^ Page 278. ^ Note 2, page 278. 

* He was a son of Colonel John Butler, and one of the most brutal of tlie Tory leaders. In the 
attack upon the defenseless people at Cherry Valley, on the 10th of November. 1778, he was the 
most conspicuous for cruelty ; m fact, he was the head and front of all the villainy perpetrated 
there. Thirty-two of the mhabitants, mostly women and children, and sixteen soldiers of the httl© 
garnson there, were kiUed. The whole settlement was then plun- 
dered, and every building in tlie village was fired. Among the pris- 
oners carried into captivity, were the wife and children of Colonel 
Campbell, who was then absent. One of the children (Judge James 
S. Campljell of Cherry Valley), then six years of age, survived until 
1808. Durhig the summer" of 1855, after an absence of seventy- 
tive years, he visited the Indian village of Caughnawaga, twelve miles 
from Montreal, where he resided some time %vith his captors. "Walter 
Butler was shot by an Oneida Indian, in West Canada Creek, and his 
body was left to be eaten by wild beasts. 

' See Campbell's Annals of Tryon County, Sunm's History of Scho- 
harie County, Stone's Life of Brant, etc. 

' Among the foreign officers who came to America in 1777, was 
the Baron Steuben, who joined the Continental army at Valley Forge 
[page 285]. He was a veteran from the armies of Frederic the b.4R0N steuben. 

Great of Prussia, and a skillful disciplinarian. He was made Inspector- 
General of the army ; and the vast advantages of his military instruction were seen on the field 
of Monmouth [page 287], and in subsequent conflicts. Steuben died at SteubenvUle, in the interior 




292 THE REVOLUTION. [177S. 

and the art of civil government ; and they had secured the alliance of France, 
the powerful European rival of Great Britain, and the sympathies of Spain and 
Holland. The British forces occupied the real position of prisoners, for they 
were hemmed in upon only two islands,' almost two hundred miles apart, and 
each about fourteen miles in length ; while the Americans possessed every 
other stronghold of the country, and, unlike the invaders, were warring for the 
dearest rights of common humanity. 

Ths scene of the most active military operations now changed. In the 
autumn [Nov. 3, 1778], D'Estaing sailed for the West Indies, to attack the 
British possessions there. To defend these, it was necessary for the British 
fleet on our coast to proceed to those waters.^ This movement would prevent 
any co-operation between the fleet and army in aggressive movements against 
the populous and now well-defended North ; they could only co-operate in act- 
ive operations against the sparsely-settled South. These considerations caused 
a change in the plans of the enemy ; and late in November [Nov. 27 J, Sir 
Henry Clinton dispatched Colonel Campbell, with aho\\t two thousand troops, 
to mvade Georgia, then the weakest member of the Confederacy. They pro- 
ceeded by water, and landed at Savannah, the capital of the State, on the 
morning of the 29th of December. General Robert Howe^ was there, with only 
about a thousand men, and these were dispirited by the failure of a recent expe- 
dition against Florida in which they had been engaged.^ They defended tho 
city nobly, however, until an overwhelming force, by power and stratagem, cony 
pelled them to retire. They then fled, in confusion, up the Savannah River, 
and took shelter in the bosom of South Carolina. The capital of Georgia be- 
came the head-quarters of the British army at the South ; and the enemy re- 
tained it until near the close of the contest [1782], even when every foot of soil 
in the State, outside the intrenchments around the city, was possessed by the 
patriots. 



CHAPTER VI, 

FIFTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. [1779.] 

Thickly mottled with clouds of evil forebodings for the Republican caui^e, 
Was the political firmament at the dawn of the year 1779. The finances of the 

of New York, in 1795, and his remains rest beneath a slab m the town of Steuben, about seven 
miles nortli-west of Trenton Falls. ' Manhattan, or York Island, and Rliode Island. 

* Admiral Hotham sailed for the "West Indies on the 3d of November ; and early in December, 
Admiral Byron, who *had just succeeded Lord Howe in chief naval command, also sailed tor that 
destination. = Page 244. 

* A great number of Tories were organized in Florida, and committed so many depredations upon 
the settlers on the Georgian frontiers, that Howe, during the summer of 1778, went thither to dis- 
perse them. He penetrated to the St. Mary's River, in June, where he awaited reinforcements, 
and supplies, by water. Want of co-operation on the part of the governor of Georgia and the naval 
commander, produced much disunion ; and sickness soon reduced the number of effective men sO' 
much, that the enterprise was abandoned. 



1779.] FIFTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR IND E PE ND E :^ C E. £93 

country were in a most wretched condition. Already, one hundred millions of 
dollars of continental money' were afloat without the security of even good 
public credit ;" and their value was rapidly depreciating. While the amount 
of the issues was small, the credit of the bills was good ; but when new emis- 
sions took place, and no adequate measures for redemption were exhibited, the 
people became suspicious of those frail representatives of money, and their value 
began to depreciate. This effect did not occur until eighteen months after 
the time of the first emission.' Twenty millions of the continental bills were 
then in circulation, besides a large amount of local issues by the several States. 
It was perceived that depreciation was inevitable, and Congress proposed, as a 
substitute for further issues, a loan of five millions, at an interest of four per 
cent. A lottery had been early authorized, and was now in operation, desio-ned 
to raise a like sum, on loan, the prizes being payable in loan-office certificates.* 
Although these offices were opened in all the States, and the interest raised to 
six per cent., the loans came in slowly. The treasury became almost exhausted, 
the loan-offices Avere overdrawn upon by the commissioners' drafts, and the issue 
of bills was reluctantly recommenced. 

The financial embarrassments were increased by the circulation of an 
immense amount of counterfeits of the continental bills, by the British 
and the loyalists, which rapidly depreciated the currency. They were 
sent out from New York, literally, by " cart-loads." ' Congress felt the neces- 
sity of making some extraordinary efforts for redeeming the genuine bills, so as 
to sustain their credit. The several States were taxed, and on the 2d of Janu- 
ary, 1779, it was, by Congress, " Eesolved, That the United States be called 
on to pay in their respective quotas of fifteen millions of dollars, for the year 
1779, and of six millions of dollars annually for eighteen years, from and after 
the year 1779, as a fund for sinking the emissions," &c. ; yet all was in vain; 
prices rose as the bills sank in value, and every kind of trade was embarrassed and 

» Page 245. 

^ At this time, when Congress, could not borrow a dollar upon its own credit, Robert Morris 
[page 264] found no difficulty in raising millions upon his own. For a long time he, alone, furnished 
the " hard money" used by that body. ^ Note 3, page 245. 

* On the tirst of November, 1776, the Continental Congress "Resolved, That a sum of money 
be raised by way of lottery, for defraying the expenses of the next campaign, the lotteiy to be 
drawn in Philadelphia." A committee was appointed to arrange the same, and on the 18th, 
reported a scheme. The drawer of more than the minimum prize in each class, was to receive 
either a treasury bank note, payable in five years, mth an annual interest at four per cent., or the 
preemption of such billets in the next succeeding class ; tliis was optional with the adventurers. 
Tliose who should not call for their prizes within six weeks after the end of the drawing, were 
considered adventurers in the next succeeding class. Seven managers were appointed, who were 
authorized to employ agents in different States to sell the tickets. The first drawing was decided to 
be made at Philadelphia, on the first of March, 1777; but purchasers were comparatively few and 
tardy, and the drawing was postponed from time to time. Various impediments continually presented 
themselves, and the plan, which promised such success at the beginning, appears to have been a 
failure. Many purchasers of tickets were losers ; and this, like some other financial schemes of the 
Revolution, was productive of much hard feeling toward the Federal Government. 

It was no secret at the time, as appears by the following advertisement in Gaines' Neiv York 
Mercury : " Advertisement. Persons going into otiier colonies, may be supplied with any number 
of counterfeited Congress notes, for the price of tlie paper per ream. They are so neatly and exactly 
■executed, that there is no risk in getting them olT, it being almost impossible to discover that they 
are not genuine. This has been proven by bills to a very large amount, which have already been 
successfully circulated. Inquire of Q. E. D., at the Coffee-house, from 11 A. M., to 4 P. M., during 
the present month. ' 



294 THE REVOLUTION. [1779; 

deranged. The federal government was thoroughly perplexed. Only about 
four millions of dollars had been obtained, by loan, from Europe, and present 
negotiations appeared futile. No French army was yet upon our soil, to aid 
us, nor had French coin yet gladdened the hearts of unpaid soldiers. A French 
fleet had indeed been upon our coasts,' but had now gone to fight battles for 
France in the West Indies, after mocking our hopes with* broken promises of 
aid.^ Gloomy, indeed, appeared the firmament at the dawn of 1779, the fifth, 
year of the War for Independence. 

In the autumn of 1777, a plan for invading Canada and the eastern British 
provinces, and for seizing the British posts on the western lakes, had been 
matured by Congress and the Board of War,^ but when it was submitted to 
Washington, his sagacious mind perceived its folly, and the influence of his 
opinions, and the discovery, by true patriots, that it was a part of the secret 
plan, entered into by Gates and others, to deprive Washington of chief com- 
mand, caused an abandonment of the scheme. Others, more feasible, occu- 
pied the attention of the Federal Legislature ; and for several weeks the com- 
mander-in-chief co-operated with Congress [January, 1779], in person, in. 
preparing a plan for the campaign of 1779. It was finally resolved to act on 
the defensive, except in retaliatory expeditions against the Indians and Tories 
in the interior." This scheme promised the most beneficial results, for it would 
be safer and less expensive, than offensive warfare. During the entire year, 
the principal military operations were carried on in the two extreme sections of 
the confederacy. The chief efforts of the Americans were directed to the con- 
finement of the British army to the seaboard, and chastising the Indian tribes. 
The winter campaign opened by Lieutenant-colonel Campbell' [December 29, 
1778], continued until June, and resulted, as we have mentioned [page 292], 
in the complete subjugation of Georgia to British rule. 

When Campbell had garrisoned Savannah, and arranged for its defense, he 
prepared to march against Sunbury, twenty-eight miles further south, the only 
post of any consequence now left to the Americans on the Georgia seaboard. 
He treated the people leniently, and, by proclamation, invited them to join the 
British standard. These measures had their desired effect, 
and timid hundreds, seeing the State under the heel of 
British power, proclaimed their loyalty, and rallied be- 
neath the standard of King George. At the same time, 
General Prevost, who was in command of the British and 
Indians in east Florida, marched northward, captured 
Sunbury [.January 9, 1779], and assumed the chief com- 
mand of the British forces in the South. With this post 
GENERAL LINCOLN. fgH the hopcs of the Republicans in east Georgia. In the 

' Page 289. " Page 289. 

^ On the 12th of June, 1776, Congress appointed a committee, to be styled the "Board of War 
and Ordnance," to have the general supervision of military affairs. John Adams was the chairman, 
and Richard Peters was secretary. Peters was the real " Secretary of War" under the old Confed- 
eration, until 1781, when he was succeeded by General Lincoln. General Gates was cliairinan ia. 
1778. * Page" 291. ■* Page 293. 




1779.] FIFTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 295 

mean while, General Benjamin Lincoln, of Massachusetts, had been appointed 
[September, 1778J, commander-in-chief of the southern arm j of patriots.' He 
made his head-quarters at Purysburg [January 6], twenty-five miles above 
Savannah, and there commenced the formation of an army, composed of some con- 
tinental regiments, new recruits, and the broken forces of General Howe.^ While 
Lincoln was collecting his army on the Carolina bank of the Savannah, Camp- 
bell marched up the Georgia side to Augusta,^ for the purpose of encouraging 
the Tories, opening a communication with the Creek Indians^ in the West (among 
whom the British had active emissaries), and to awe the Whigs. At the same 
time a band of Tories, under Colonel Boyd, was desolating the Carolina fron- 
tiers, while on their march to join the royal troops. When within two days' 
march of Augusta, they were attacked^ [February 14, 1779] and utterly defeated 
by Colonel Pickens, at the head of the militia of Ninety-six.* Boyd and 
seventy of his men were killed, and seventy-five were made prisoners.' Pick- 
ens lost thirty-eight of his men. 

This defeat of Boyd alarmed Campbell and encouraged Lincoln. The latter 
immediately sent General Ashe, of North Carolina, with about two thousand 
men,^ to drive Campbell from Augusta, and to confine the invaders to the low, 
sickly sections near the sea, hoping for aid from the deadly malaria of the 
swamps, when the heats of summer should prevail. The British fled [February 
13,. 1779 J at the approach of Ashe, and were pursued by him [February IG] 
as far as Brier Creek, about forty miles belo^v Augusta, where he halted to 
establish a camp. There Ashe was surprised and defeated [March 3] by Gen- 
eral Prevost, who, with quite a large force, was marching up the Savannah to 
the relief of Campbell. Ashe lost almost his entire army by death, captivity, and 
dispersion. Some were killed, others perished in the morasses, and many were 
drowned in attempting to escape across tho Savannah." This blow deprived 
Lincoln of one fourth of his army, and led to the temporary ro-e.^tablishment of 
royal government in Georgia.'" 

' Benjamin Lincoln was born in Hingham, Massachusetts, in 1733. He was a farmer, yet took 
an active part in public affairs. He joined the continental array in 1777, and rose rapidly to the 
station of major-general He commanded the militia against Shay's insurgents [See 5, page 353.] 
in 1786. He was also a useful pubhe officer in civil afthirs, and died in 1810. ^ Pago 292. 

^ When Campbell departed for Augusta, Prevost sent Colonel Gardiner with some troops, to take 
possession of Port Jioyal Island, some sixty miles below Charleston, preparatory to a march upon 
that city. Gardiner was attacked by General Moultrie [page 249], with Charleston militia, on the 
morning of the 3d of February. Almost every British officer (except the commander), and many 
privates, were killed. Gardiner and a few men escaped in boats, and Moultrie, whose loss waa 
trilling, joined Lincoln at Purysburg. * Page 30. 

^ The place of the skirmish was upon Kettle Creek, in Oglethorpe countv, Georgia. 

' Page 33G. 

' Seventy of th.em were tried and found guilty of treason, and sentenced to bo hung. Only five 
were executed 

^ Lincoln was joined by Generals Ashe- and Rutherford, with North Carolina regiments, -ibout 
the first of Februf<ry, and his army now amounted to little more than three thousand nn n. John 
Ashe was born in England in 1721, and came to America when a child. He was engaged in the 
Regulator War [page 223], and was one of the most active of the North Carolina patriots. Ho died 
of small-pox in 1781. 

' About one hundred and fifty were killed and drowned, eighty-nine were made prisoners, and 
a large number, who were dispersed, did not take up arms again for si v> ral months. 

'" At the beginning of 1776, the bold Whigs of Savannah had va.\A^ the royal governor. Sir 
James Wright, a prisoner in his own liouse ; and the provincial Assembly, assumiiag governmental 



296 ■ THE REVOLUTION. [1779. 

Prevost now prepared for an invasion of South Carolina. Toward the last 
of April, he crossed the Savannah [April 27J with two thousand regulars, and 
a lar"-c bodj of Tories and Creek Indians, and marched for Charleston. Lin- 
coln had recruited, and was now in the field with about five thousand men, 
preparing to recover lost Georgia, by entering the State at Augusta, and sweep- 
ino- the country to the sea. But when he discovered the progress of Prevost, 
and that even the danger of losing Savannah did not deter that active general 
from his attempts upon Charleston, Lincoln hastened to the relief of the men- 
aced city. The people on the line of his march hailed him as a deliverer, for 
Prevost had marked his progress by plunder, conflagration, and cruelty. For- 
tunately for the Republicans, the invader's march was so slow, that when he 
arrived [May 11] before the city, the people were prepared for resistance. 

Prevost, on the morning of the 11th of May, approached the American 
intrenchments thrown across Charleston Neck,' and demanded an immediate 
surrender of the city. He was answered by a prompt refusal, and the remain- 
der of the day was spent by both parties, in preparations for an assault. That 
nio-ht was a fearful one for the citizens, for they expected to be greeted at dawn 
with bursting bomb-shells," and red-hot cannon-balls. When morning came 
[May 12, 1779], the scarlet uniforms of the enemy were seen across the waters 
upon John's Island, and not a hostile foot was upon the Charleston peninsula. 
The cause of this was soon made manifest. Prevost had been informed of the 
approach of Lincoln, and fearing his connection with Savannah might be cut 
off, he commenced a retreat toward that city, at midnight, by way of the islands 
along the coast. For more than a month some British detachments lingered 
upon John's Island. Then they were attacked at Stono Ferry, ten miles below 
Charleston [June 20] by a party of Lincoln's army, but after a severe engage- 
ment, and the loss of almost three hundred men in killed and wounded, they 
repulsed the Americans whose loss was greater. Prevost soon afterward 
established a military post at Beaufort, on Port Royal Island,^ and then retreated 
to Savannah. The hot season produced a suspension of hostihties in the South, 
and that region enjoyed comparative repose for several months. 

Sir Henry Clinton was not idle while these events were in progress at the 
South. He was sending out marauding expeditions from New York, to plunder 
and harass the people on the sea-coast. Governor Tryon* went from Kings- 
bridge' on the 25th of March [1779], with fifteen hundred British regulars and 

powers, made provisions for militar.y defense [February, 177G], issued bills of credit, &c. "Wright 
escaped and went to England. He returned in July, 1779, and resumed his office as governor of 
the "colony." 

* Charleston, like Boston [note 3, page 229], is situated upon a peninsula, the neck of which is 
made quite narrow by the Ashley and Cooper Rivers, and the marshes. Across this the Americans 
had hastily cast up embankments. They served a present purpose, and being strengthened, were 
of great value to the Americans the following year. See page 310. 

" Hollow balls or shells of cast iron, filled with gunpowder, slugs. &c. In an orifice communi- 
cating with the powder, is a slow match. This is ignited, and the shell is hurled from a mortar (a 
short cannon) into the midst of a town or an army. "When the powder ignites, the shell is bursted 
into fragments, and these with the slutrs make terrible havoc. They are sometimes the size of a 
man's head. ' Note 5. page 166. * Page 248. 

^ The passage across the Harlem River (or as it is sometimea there called, Spuyten Duyvil Creek), 
at the upper end of York or Manhattan Island, 



1779.] FIFTH YEAH OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 09^ 

Hessians/ to destroy some salt-works at Ilorsencck, and attack an American 
detachment under General Putnam, at Greenwich, in Connecticut. The Amer- 
icans were dispersed [March 2G], and Putnam barely escaped capture by some 
dragoons." He rallied his troops at Stamford, pursued the British on their 
return toward New York the same evening, recaptured a quantity of plunder in 
their possession, and took thirty-eight of them prisoners. 

On the 9th of May, Sir George Collier entered Hampton Roads, ^ with a 
small fleet, bearing General Mathews, with land troops, destined to ravage the 
country in that vicinity. They spread desolation on both sides of the Elizabeth 
River, from the Roads to Norfolk and Portsmouth. Aftor destroying a vast 
amount of property, they withdrew ; and at the close of the month, the same 
vessels and the same troops were up the Hudson River, assisting Sir Henry 
Clinton in the capture of the fortress at Stony Point, and also the small fort on 
Verplanck's Point, opposite. Both of these posts fell into the power of the 
British, after a spirited resistance ; the first on the 31st of INIay, and the latter 
on the 1st of June. These achievements accomplished, Collier, with a band 
of twenty-five hundred marauders, under Governor Tryon, sailed on the night 
of the 4th of July [1779 j, for the shores of Connecticut, to plunder and destroy 
the towns on the coast. They plundered New Haven on the 5th, laid East 
Haven in ashes on the 6th, destroyed Fairfield in the same way on the 8 th, and 
burned and plundered Norwalk on the 12th. Not content with this wanton 
destruction of property, the invaders insulted and cruelly abused the defense- 
less inhabitants. While Norwalk was burning, Tryon sat in a rocking-chair, 
upon an eminence near by, and viewed the scene with great complacency, and 
apparent pleasure — a puny imitation of Nero, who fiddled while Rome was 
blazing.'' The Hessian mercenaries generally accompanied these expeditions, for, 
unlike the British soldiers, they were ev^er eager to apply the torch and abuse 
the inhabitants. They were the fit instruments for such a warfare. When 
Tryon (whom the English people abhorred for his wrong-doings in America), 
had completed the destruction of these pleasant villages, he boasted of his ex- 

* Page 246. 

' On this occasion he performed the feat, so often related, of descending a steep hill on horse- 
back, making his way, as common history asserts, down a flight of stone steps, which had been 
constructed for the convenience of people who had to ascend this hill to a church on its summit. 
The whole matter is an exaggeration. An eye-witness of the event says that Putnam pursued a 
zig-zag course down the hill, and only descended four or five of the steps near the bottom. The 
feat was not at all extraordinary when we consider that a troop of dragoons, with loaded pistols, 
were at his heels. Thes?, however, dared not follow the general. In 1825, when a company of 
horsemen were escorting La Fayette — the "Nation's Guest" — along the road at that place, some of 
them went down the same declivity on horseback. The stone steps are now [1883] visible in some 
places, among the shrubbery and overlying sod. 

^ Page 69. This is a body of water at the conjunction of the James and Elizabeth Rivers, and 
communicating with the sea. It is one of the most spacious harbors ui the world. The village of 
Hampton lies upon its northern border. See page 243. 

* Alluding to these outrages of Tryon, and the burning of Kingston [page 283] by Vaughaii, 
Trumbull, in his M^Fingal, says : 

" Behold, like whelps of British lion. 
Our warriors, Clinton, Vaughan, and Tryon, 
March forth, with patriotic joy, 
To ravish, plunder, and destroy. 
Great generals ! Foremost in their nation — 
The journeymen of desolation!" 



298 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1779. 




STONY POINT. 



treme clemency in leaving a single house standing on the New England 
coast. 

While these marauding forays were in progress, 
the Americans were not idle. They were preparing to 
Strike the enemy heavy and unexpected blows. Only 
three days after the destruction of Norwalk [July 15 j, 
General Anthony Wayne was marching secretly to 
attempt the re-capture of Stony Point, on the Hud- 
son. The fort stood upon a rocky promontory, sur- 
rounded by water and a marsh, and was very strong 
in its position. So secretly was the whole movement 
conducted, that the British garrison were unsuspicious 
of danger. At midnight, the little army of patriots 

crossed the morass in the rear, and attacked the fort 
with ball and bayonet, at two separate points, in the 
face of a heavy cannonade from the aroused garrison. 
At two o'clock in the morning [July 16, 1779], Wayne, 
though so badly wounded in the head by a glancing 
blow of a bullet, as to fall senseless, wrote to Washing- 
ton, " The fort and garrison, with Colonel Johnson, are 
ours. Our officers and men behaved like men who are 
determined to be free." This was considered one of 
the most brilliant events of the war.* The British lost, 
in killed, wounded, and prisoners, about six hundred 
men ; the loss of the Americans was fifteen killed, and eighty-three wounded. 
The spoils were a large amount of military stores. The post was abandoned by 
the Americans, for, at that time, troops sufficient to garrison it could not be 
spared.' 

The capture of Stony Point was followed by another brilliant achievement, 
a month later [August 19], when Mnjor Henry Lee,= at three o'clock iu the 
morning, surprised a British garrison at Paulus' Hook (now Jersey City)/ op- 
posite New York, killed thirty soldiers, and took one hundred and sixty pris- 




GENERAL WAYNE. 



' "Wayne was highly complimented by all General Charles Lee [page 248], who was not on 
the most friendly terms with Wayne, wrote to him, saying, "I do most seriously declare that your 
assault of Stony Point is not only the. most brilliant, in my opinion, throughout the whole course of 
the war, on either side, but that it is the most brilliant I am acquainted with in history. The as- 
sault of Schiveidnitz, by Marshal Laudon, I tliink inferior to it." Dr. Rush wrote, saying, "Our 
streets rang for many days with nothing but the name of General Wayne. You are remembered 
constantly next to our good and great Washington, over our claret and Madeira. You have estab- 
lished the national character of our country; you have taught our enemies that bravery, humanity, 
and magnanimity are the national virtues of the Americans." Congress gave him thanks, and a 
gold medal ; and sUver medals were awarded to Colonels Stewart and De Fleury, for their gallantry 
on the occasion. Anthony Wayne was born in Pennsylvania in 1745. He was a professional sur- 
veyor, then a provincial legislator, and became a soldier in 1775. He was very active during the 
whole war; and was efficient in subduing the Indians in the Ohio country, in 1795 [see page 374]. 
He died at Erie, on his way liome, near the close of 1796. 

^ After tlie Americans liad captured Stony Point, they turned the cannons upon Fort La Fay- 
ette, upon Verplanck's Point, opposite. General Robert Howe [page 292] was directed to attack 
that post, but on account of some delays, he did not reach there before Sir Henry Clinton sent up 
relief for the garrison. ^ Note 2, page 133. * Note 1, page 94. 



1T79.] 



FIFTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



29^ 



oners. This gallant act was greatly applauded in the camp, in Congress, and 
throughout the country, and made the enemy more cautious and circumspect. 
The hero was honored by Congress with thanks and a gold medal. These and 
gome smaller successes at about this time, elated the Americans ; but their joy 
was soon turned into sorrow, because of disasters in the extreme East. Massa- 
chusetts had fitted out almost forty vessels to attempt the seizure of a British 
post on the Penobscot River. The assailants delayed more than a fortnight 
after their arrival [July 25] before determining to carry the place by storm. 
Just as the troops were about to land for the purpose, a British fleet arrived, 
destroyed the flotilla, took many of the soldiers and sailors prisoners, and drove 
the remainder into the wilderness [Aug. 13]. These, after great hardships in 
the forests, reached Boston toward the close of September. 




The storm of war was not confined to the Atlantic settlements. It burst 
over the lofty Alleghanies, and at an early period, even while it was gathering, 
a low, muttering peal of thunder came from clouds that brooded over the far- 
off wilderness of the great valleys of the West. Pioneers from the sea-board 
colonies were there, and they were compelled, almost at the moment of arrival, 
to wage war with the Indian, and hunt savage men as well as savage beasts. 
Among the earliest and most renowned of these pioneers, was Daniel Boone, 
the great " Hunter of Kentucky," of whom Byron wrote, 

" Of all men, saving Sylla, the man-slayer, 

"Who passes for, in life and death, most lucky, 



SOO THE IlEYOLUTIOX. [1719. 

Of the great names which in our faces stare, 

The General Boone, backwoodsman of Kentucky, 
"Was happiest among mortals anywhere." ' 

He went west of the Blue Ridge as earlj as 17G9, and in 1773, his own 
and a few other families accompanied him to the paradise lying among the 
rich valleys south of the Ohio River.' From that period until the power of the 
Tfestern Indians (who were continually incited to hostilities by the British and 




Tories) was broken by George Rogers Clarke, Boone's 
continual warfare with the children of the forest. 



life was one of almost 



Nor did Boone and his companions measure strength with the Indians alone j 



' Don Juan, VIII., Ixi. 

' The wife and daughters of Boone were the first white females that set foot in the valleys west 
of the AUeghanies. Daniel Boone was born in Berks county, Pennsylvania, in 1734. "While ho 
was a small boy, his parents settled on the Yadkin, in North Carolina. When in the prime of life, 
he went over the mountains, and became a famous hunter. He planted the first settlement on the 
Kain-tuck-ee River, yet known as Boonsborough. During the Revolution he fought the Indians 
bravely, and was a prisoner among them for some time, but escaped. He was active in all matters 
pertaining to the settlement of Kentucky, until it became an independent State. Yet he was, by 
the technicalities of law, doomed to be disinherited of every foot of the soil he had helped to 
redeem from the wilderness, and, at almost eighty years of age, he was trapping beaver upon the 
Little Osage River, beyond the Mississippi. He died in Missouri, when almost ninety years of 
age, in September, 1820. 




r -^ 






Clark's Expedition aukoss the Drowned Lands. 



1779.] FIFTH YEAR OF THE;^^WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 303 

Jbut ia time they confronted white leaders and white followers. These conflicts, 
however, were only a series of border forays, until 1778, when Major George 
Rogers Clarke' led a regular expedition against the frontier posts of the enemy, 
in the wilderness in the far north-west, now the States of Indiana and Illinois. 
His little army rendezvoused at the ^'alls of the Ohio, where Louisville now 
stands, where he was joined by Simon Kenton, and other pioneers. From 
thence they penetrated the country northward, and on the 4th of July [1778]. 
they captured Kaskaskia." On the 9th, they took the village of Cahokia, 
sixty miles further up the river ; and finally, in August, the stronger British 
post of Vincennes, on the Wabash, fell into their hands. 

Acting in the capacity of a peace-maker, Clarke was working successfully 
towird the pacification of the western tribes, when, in the month of January, 
1779, the commander of the British fort at Detroit retook "Vincennes. With 
one hundred and seventy-five men, Clarke penetrated the dreadful wilderness 
a hundred miles ^ from the Ohio. For a whole week they traversed the 
"drowned lands" of Illinois, suffering every privation from wet, cold, and 
hunger. When they arrived at the Little Wabash, at a point where the forks 
of the stream are three miles apart, they found the intervening space covered 
with water to the depth of three feet. The points of dry land were five miles 
apart, and all that distance those hardy soldiers, in the month of February, 
waded the cold snow-flood' in tlie forest, sometimes arm-pit deep ! They 
arrived in sight of Vincennes on the 18th [February, 1779], and the next 
morning at dawn, with their faces blackened with gunpowder, to make them- 
selves appear hideous, they crossed the river in a boat, and pushed toward the 
town. On the 20th, the stripes and stars were again unfurled over the fort at 
Vincennes and a captured garrison. Had armed men dropped from the clouds, 
the people and soldiers at Vincennes could not have been more astonished, than 
at the apparition of these troops, for it seemed impossible for them to have 
traversed the deluged country. 

The indignation of the people was fiercely aroused by the atrocities at 
Wyoming and upon the head waters of the Susquehanna; and in the summer of 
1779, General Sullivan* was sent into the heart of the country of the Six Na- 
tions," to chastise and humble them. He collected troops in the Wyoming 



' George Rogers Clarke, was born in Albemarle county, Virginia, in 1752, and first appears in 
history as an adv.nturer beyond the Alleghanies, twenty years afterward. He had been a land- 
s u-veyor, and first went to the Ohio region in 1772. He was a captain in Dunmore's ariay [note 4 
paj'e 237] in 1774, and in 1775. he accompanied some emigrants to Kentucky. Pleased with tho 
country, he determined to make it his homo ; and during the war for Independence, he labored 
nobly to secure the vast region of the west and north-west, as a home for the free. Under his 
leadership, what afterward became tlie North-west Territory, was disenthralled, and he has been 
anpr>)priately styled the Father of that region. He was promoted to the rank of brigadier, after 
-'Tvia^' under the Baron Steuben against Arnold, in Virginia, in 1781, and at the close of the war 

!• • iiained in Kentucky. He died near Louisville, in February, 1818, at the age of sixty-sis 
.r^. 2 Page 180. ' Note 3, page 241. 

* John Sullivan was born in Maine, in 1740. He was a delegate in the first Continental Con- 
r ■ s [1774], and was one of the first eight brigadiers in the Continental Army. After being in act- 
.V ' -service about four years, he resigned liis commission in 1779. He was afterward a member of 
Oon;res3, and governor of New Hampshire, and died in 1795. 

^ l^age 25. British emissaries had gained over to the royal interest the whole of the Six Na- 
tion's except the Gneidas. These were kept loyal to the republicans, cliiefly through the instru- 



^ 

/. 




304 THE RBVOJ,.UTIOi^. [1773; 

Valley ; and on tlie last day of July, marched up the Susquehanna, with 
about three thousand soldiers. At Tioga Point, he met General James Clinton,' 
on the 22d of August, who came from the Mohawk 
Valley, with about sixteen hundred men. On the 29th, 
they fell upon a body of Indian and Tory savages, 
strongly fortified, at Chemung (now Elmira), and dis- 
persed them. Without waiting for them to rally, Sulli- 
van moved forward, and penetrated the country to the 
Genesee River. In the course of three weeks, he de- 
stroyed forty Indian villages, and a vast amount of food 
growing in fields and gardens. One hundred and sixty 

GENERAL SULLIVAN. ,, J 1 1 1 i? • j.V, £ 1J J • 

thousand bushels of corn m the fields and m granaries 
were destroyed ; a vast number of the finest fruit-trees, the product of years of 
tardy growth, were cut down ; hundreds of gardens covered with edible vegetables, 
were desolated ; the inhabitants were driven into the forests to starve, and were 
hunted like wild beasts ; their altars were overturned, and their graves trampled 
upon by strangers ; and a beautiful, well-watered country, teeming Avith a 
prosperous people, and just rising from a wilderness state, by the aid of culti- 
vation, to a level with the productive regions of civilization, was desolated and 
cast back a century in the space of a fortnight" To us, looking upon the scene 
from a point so remote, it is diificult to perceive the necessity that called for a 
chastisement so cruel and terrible. But that such necessity seemed to exist we 
should not doubt, for it was the judicious and benevolent mind of Washington 
that conceived and planned the campaign, and ordered its rigid execution in the 
manner in which it was accomplished. It awed the Indians for the moment, 
but it did not crush them. In the reaction they had greater strength. It 
kindled the fires of deep hatred, which spread far among the tribes upon the 
lakes and in the valley of the Ohio. Washington, like Demetrius, the son of 
Antigonus, received from the savages the name of An-na-ta-kau-les, which sig- 
nifies a taker of towns ^ or Town Destroyer.' 

mentality of one or two Christian missionaries. After the war, those of the Six Nations who joined 
the British, pleaded, as an excuse, the noble sentiment of loyalty. They were the friends of the En- 
slish, and regarded the parent country as their ally. "When they saw the cliildren of their great 
lather, the king, rebelling against him, they felt it to be their duty, in accordance with stipulations 
of solemn treaties, to aid him. . 

' General James Clinton was bom in Ulster county, New York, in 1736. He was a captain in 
the French and Indian War, and an active officer during the Revolution. He died in 1812. 

"^ The Seneca Indians were beginning to cultivate rich openings in the forests, known as the 
"Genesee Flats," quite extensively. They raised large quantities of corn, and cultivated gardens 
.nnd orchards. Their dwellings, however, were of the rudest character, and their villages consisted 

' of a small collection of these miserable huts, of no value except for v/inter shelter. 

, ^ At a council held in Philadelphia in 1792, Corn Planter, the distinguished Seneca chief, thus 

, addressed Washington, then President of the United States: "Father — The voice of the Seneca 
nation speaks to you, the great counselor, in whose heart the wise men of all the thirteen fires have 
placed their wisdom. It may be very small in your ears, and, therefore, we entreat you to hearken 

■ with attention, for we are about to speak to you of things which to us are very great. When your 
army entered the country of the Six Nations, we called you TJit Town Destroyer; and to this day, 
when that name is heard, our women look behind them and turn pale, and our children cling close 
to the necks of their mothers. Our counselors and warriois are men, and can not be afraid ; but 
their hearts are grieved with the fears of our women and children, and desire that it may be buried 
so deep that it may be heard no more." 



1779.] 



FIFTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



305 




SIEGE OF SAVANNAH. 1779. 



While these events were in progress at the North, the Southern armj, 
under Lincoln/ was preparing to attack Savannah, in concert with the French 

fleet, then in the West Indies. During that sum- , 

mer, Count D'Estaing had battled successfully 
with Admiral Bjron there, and early in Septem- 
ber, he appeared off the coast of Georgia with a 
powerful fleet, prepared to co-operate with Lincoln. 
D'Estaing landed troops and heavy battery cannon 
a few miles below Savannah ; and on the 23d of 
September, the combined armies commenced the 
siege. It was soon perceived that the town must 
be taken by regular approaches, and to that end 
all energy was directed. On the morning of the 4th of October, a heavy can- 
nonade and bombardment was opened upon the Britsh works. It continued for 
five days, but with very little effect upon the strong British intrenchments. 
D"Estaing became impatient of delay, ^ and proposed an attempt to take the 
place by storm. It was reluctantly agreed to, for there seemed a certainty of 
final victory if the siege should continue. D'Estaing would listen to no re- 
monstrances, and the assault commenced on the morning of the 9th of October. 
After five hours of severe conflict, there was a truce for the purpose of burying 
the dead. Already, nearly a thousand of the French and Americans had been 
killed and wounded.^ The standards of France and Carolina, which gallant men 
had planted upon the parapet, had been torn down. Yet important breaches were 
made, and another assault promised a sure triumph. But D'Estaing, strangely 
perverse, was unwilling to renew the assault, and made preparations to withdraw. 
Lincoln yielded a reluctant assent to the movement, and the enterprise was 
abandoned at the moment when the American commander felt certain of victory.* 
Ten days afterward, the French fleet had left the coast, and Lincoln was re- 
treating toward Charleston. Thus closed the campaign for 1779, at the South. 
The repulse at Savannah was a severe blow to the hopes of the patriots of 
Georgia, and spread a gloom over the whole South. Toward the Georgia sea- 
board, every semblance of opposition to royal power was crushed, and only in 
the interior did armed resistance appear. 

' Page 294. ~~~ ~~ 

' D'Estaing expressed his fears, not only of the arrival of a British fleet, to blockade his ovra ia 

the Savannah River, but of the autumn storms, which might damage his vessels before he could get 

to sea. 

^ Among the mortally wounded, was Count Pulaski, the brave Pole 
whom we first mot in the battle on the Brandjrwine [note 5, page 273]. 
He died on board a vessel bound for Charleston, a few days after the 
siege. Serjeant Jasper, whose bravery at Fort Moultrie we have not- 
iced [note 5, page 249]. was also killed, while nobly holding aloft, uporf 
a bastion of tlie British works which he had mounted, one of the beauti- 
ful colors [note 5, page 249] presented to Moultrie's regiment by ladies 
of Charleston. The colors were beautifully embroidered, and given to 
the regiment, in the name of the ladies of Charleston, by Mrs. Su- 
sanna Elliott. Just before he died, Jasper said, " Tell Mrs. Elliott I 
lost my life supporting the colors she presented to our regiment." These 
colors, captured during this siege, are among British trophies in the 
tower of London. Savannah honors both these heroes by having finely- 
shaded parks bearing their respective names. * Page 289. 




COUNT PULASKI. 



S06 THE REVOLUTION". [177?. 

After the close of Sullivan's campaign against the Senecas, very little of 
general interest transpired at the North, except the withdrawal of the British 
troops from Rhode Island, on the 25th of October, 1779. La Fayette had 
been in France during the summer, and chiefly through his efforts, the French 
government had consented to send another powerful fleet, ^ and several thousand 
troops, to aid the Americans. When informed of this intended expedition, the 
British ministry ordered Clinton to cause the evacuation of Rhode Island, and 
to concentrate, at New York, all his troops at the North. This was accom- 
plished with as little delay as possible, for rumors had reached Rhode Island 
that the new French armament was approaching the coast. So rapid was the 
retreat of the British, caused by their fears, that they left behind them all their 
heavy artillery, and a large quantity of stores. Clinton sailed for the South at 
the close of the year [December 25], with about five thousand troops, to open a 
vigorous campaign in the Carolinas. "Washington, in the mean while, had gone 
into winter quarters at Morristown," where his troops suffered terribly from the 
severity of the cold, and the lack of provisions, clothing, and shelter.^ Strong 
detachments were also stationed among the Hudson Highlands, and the cavalry 
were cantoned in Connecticut. 

During this fifth year [1779] of the war for Independence, difficulties had 
gathered thick and fast around Great Britain. Spain had declared war against 
her* on the 16th of June, and a powerful French and Spanish naval armament 
had attempted to effect an invasion of England in August. American and 
French cruisers now became numerous and quite powerful, and were hovering 
around her coasts ; and in September, the intrepid John Paul Jones^ had 
conquered two of her proud ships of war, after one of the most desperate 

» Page 286. =* Page 269. 

' Dr. Thacher, in his Military Journal, says, " The sufferings of the poor soldiers can scarcely be 
described ; while on duty they are unavoidably exposed to all the inclemency of storms and severe 
cold ; at night, they now have a bed of straw upon the ground, and a single blanket to each man ; 
they are badly clad, and .'^ome are destitute of shoes. We have contrived a kind of stone chimney 
outside, and an opening at one end of our tents gives us the beneflt of the fire within. The snow 
is now [January 6th, 1780] from four to six feet deep, which so obstructs the roads as to prevent 
our receiving a supply of provisions. For the last ten days we have received but two pounds of 
meat a man, and we are frequently for six or eight days entirely destitute of meat, and then as long 
without bread. The consequence is, the soldiers are so enfeebled from hunger and cold as to be 
almost unable to perform their military dutj', or labor in constructing their huts. It is well known 
that General Washington experiences the greatest solicitude for the suflering of his army, and 
is sensible that they, in general, conduct with heroic patience and fortitude." In a private 
letter to a friend, Washington said, " We have had the virtue and patience of the array put to the 
severest trial. Sometimes it has been five or six days together without bread, at other times as 
many without meat, and once for two or three days at a time without either. * * * At one 
time the soldiers ate every kind of horse food but hay. Buckwheat, common wheat, rye, and Indian 
corn composed the meal which made their bread. As an army, they bore it with the most heroic 
patience ; but sufferings like these, accompanied by the want of clothes, blankets, &c., will produce 
frequent desertions in all armies ; and so it happened with us, though it did not excite a single 
mutiny." 

* Hoping to regain Gibraltar, Jamaica, and the two Floridas, which Great Britain had taken 
from her, Spain made a secret treaty of peace with France in April, 1779, and in June declared war 
against Great Britain. This event was regarded as highly favorable to the Americans, because any 
thing that should cripple England, would aid them. 

* John Paul Jones was born in Scotland in 1747, and came to Virginia in boyhood. He entered 
me American naval service in 1775, and was active during the whole war. He ivas afterward 
very active in the Russian service, against the Turks, in the Black Sea, and was created rear-admi- 
ral In the Russian navy. He died in Paris in 1782. 




)ism iPATiiL c^jojmies ib®^s]eidkh© Tjsm ^mmMF'm 



1779.] 



FIFTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR lif D E FEN D EN CE. 



307 



naval fights ever known. These were the Serapis and Countess of Scar- 
borouf/h. Tlie conflict occurred in the evening, off Flamborough Head, on the 
east coast of Scotland. Jones's ship was the Bonhomme Richard, which had 
been fitted out in France. After much maneuvering, the Serapis and 




Richard came alongside of each other, their rigging intermingling, and in this 
position they poured heavy broadsides from their respective guns. Three times 
both ships were on fire, and their destruction appeared inevitable. A part of 
the time the belligerents were fighting hand to hand upon the decks. Finally, 
the commander of the Serapis was obliged to yield, and ten minutes afterward, 
the Countess of Scarborough, which had been fighting with another vessel of 
Jones's little fleet, struck her colors. The Richard was a perfect wreck, and 
was fast sinking when the conflict ended ; and sixteen hours afterward, she went 
do'.vn into the deep waters of the North Sea, off Bridlington Bay. Jones, with 
tiis prizes, sailed for Holland, having, during that single cruise, captured prop- 
erty to the value of two hundred thousand dollars.' 



* The naval operations during the war for Independence, do 

not occupy a conspicuous place in history, yet tliey were by no cvL^is^i 

means insigQificarit. The Continental Congress took action on the 

subject of an armed marine, in tlie autumn of 1775. Already 

"Washington had fitted out some armed vessels at Boston, and 

constructed some gun-boats for use in tlie waters around that city. a gux-boat at host on. 

These were propelled by oars, and covered. In November, the 

government of Massachusetts established a Board of Admiralty. A committee on naval affiiirs, of 

which Silas Deane [page 266] was chairman, was appointed by the Continental Congress in Octo- 



308 THE REVOLUTION. [1779. 

On the land, in America, there had been very little success for the British 
arms ; and sympathy for the patriots was becoming more and more manifest in 
Europe. Even a great portion of the intelligent English people began to 
regard the war as not only useless, but unjust. Yet in the midst of all these 
difficulties, the government put forth mighty energies — energies which might 
have terminated the war during the first campaign, if they had been then 
executed. Parliament voted eighty-five thousand seamen and tiiirti'^-five thou- 
sand troops for general service, in 1780, and appropriated one \iundred millions 
of dollars to defray the expenses. This formidable armament in prospective, 
was placed before the Americans, at this, the gloomiest period of the war, yet 
they neither quailed nor faltered. Relying upon the justice of their cause, and 
the favor of a righteous God, they felt prepared to' meet any force that Great 
Britain might send to enslave them 

ber, 1775. Before the close of the year, the construction of almost twentjr vessels had been ordered 
by Congress; and the Marine Committee was so re-organized as to have in it a representative from 
each colony. In November, 1776, a Continental Navy Board, to assist the Marine Committee, was 
appointed; and in October, 1779, a Boa/rd of Admiralty was installed. Its Secretary (equivalent to 
our Secretary of the Navy) [page 382] was John Brown, until 1781, when he was succeeded by 
General McDougal. llobert Morris also acted as authorized Agent of Marine ; and many privateers 
were fitted out by him on his own account. In November, 1776, 
Congress determined the relative rank of the naval commanders, such 
as admiral to be equal to a major-general on land : a commodore equal 
to a brigadier-general, &c. The iirst commander-in-cliief of the navy, 
or high admiral, was Esek Hopkins, of Rhode Island, whom Congress 
commissioned as such in December, 1775. He first went against 
Dunmore [page 244] on the coast of Virginia^ He also -c^nt to the 
Bahamas, and captured the town of New Providence and its governor. 
Sailing for home, he captured some British vessels off the east end of 
Long Island, and with these prizes, he Avent into Narraganset Bay. 
In the mean while, Paul Jones and Captain Barry were doing 
good service, and New England cruisers were greatly annoying 
English shipping on our coast. In 1777, Dr. Franklin, under the 
authority of Congress, issued commissions to naval officers in Europe. 
Expeditions were fitted out in French sea-ports, and these produced 
ADMIRAL HOPKINS. great alarm on the British coasts. 

While these things were occurring in European waters. Captains 
Biddle, Manly, M'Neil, Hinman, Barry, and others, were making many prizes on the American 
coasts. Finally, in the spring of 1779, an expedition was fitted out at L'Orient, under the auspices 
of the French and American governments. It consisted of five vessels under the command of John 
Paul Jones. Tliey sailed first, in June, for the British waters, took a few prizes, and returned. 
They sailed again in August, and on the 23d of September, while off the coast of Scotland, not far 
above the mouth of the Humber, Jones, with his flag-ship (the Bonhomme Richard), and two others, 
fell in with and encountered a small British fleet, which was convoying a number of merchant ves- 
sels to the Baltic Sea, when the engagement took place which is described in the text. Congress 
gave Jones a gold medal for his bravery. Many other gallant acts were performed by American 
seamen, in the regular service and as privateers, during the remainder of the war. The " whale- 
boat warfare" on the coast, was also very interesting, and exhibited many a brave deed by those 
whose names are not recorded in history — men who belong to the great host of " unnamed demi- 
gods," who, in aU ages, have given their services to swell the triumphs of leaders who, in real 
merit, have oft:en been less deserving than themselves. 

For a condensed account of the whole naval operations of the Revolution, on the coast, see sup- 
plement to Lossing's Fi.eld Book of the Hsvolution. 




.iSO.j SIXTH TEAR OF '.HE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. g09 

CHATTER VII. 

SIXTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. [1780.] 

When, on Christmas day, 1779, Sir Henry Clinton sailed for the South, 
with the main body of his army, he left the Hessian general, Knyphausen,' in 
command at New York. To aid the southern patriots, Washington spnt thither 
the Baron De Kalb'' and others the following spring [1780J, and thus the 
two armies were so much weakened at head-quarters, that military operations at 
the North almost ceased during that year. The Carolinas became the chief 
theater of war, and many and bloody were the acts upon that stage. Invasions 
from without, and the cruelties of Tories^ in their midst, made 1780 a year of 
great woe for the patriots and their families below the Roanoke, for they also 
suffered all the horrors of civil war. At no time, during the 
whole conflict, were the Tories, or adherents of the crown, more 2gJ»» ^^ ^ 
active throughout the whole country, than in 1780. They ^ju^ /•%#''/- 
were the most inveterate enemies of the patriots, and the lead- "»• V ©* 
ers were in continual correspondence with each other, with the g| ^i/I j^c: 
British government, and with the royal commanders in Amer- j^ ~^ 

ica. Their correspondence was carried on chiefly in cipher — f-" ^ '^ 
writing, understood only by themselves, so that in the event of ^ „^ ^^ 
their letters falling into the hands of the Whigs, their contents ' /^ 

would remain a secret. These characters sometimes varied, and L^ '^C' ^A^ 
it was a frequent occurrence for two persons to invent a cipher Sit :;»^ 
alphabet, for their own exclusive use. The engraving shows '' *^ *^ 
the alphabet of the cipher writing of some New York Tories. ZZf ^"2^ ICu 

A fleet, under Admiral Arbuthnot, with two thousand ma- ;, ^^^ k 
rines, bore the forces of Sir Henry Clinton to the southern / *^ ""^ 
waters. After encountering heavy storms,^ they arrived on the 
coast of Georgia in January ; and early in February [Feb. 10], turned north- 
ward, and proceeded to invest Charleston. Clinton's troops were landed [Feb. 
11] upon the islands below the city, on the shores of the Edisto Inlet, thirty 
miles distant ; but instead of marching at once to make an assault upon the 
town, the British commander prepared for a regular siege. General Lincoln 
was in Charleston with a feeble force' when Clinton landed ; and he was about 
to evacuate the city and flee to the interior, when intelligence of the tardy plans 
of the British reached him. He then resolved to remain, and prepare for de- 

* Page 259. " Page 316. " Note 4, page 226. 

* During a severe storm off Cape Hatteras, one vessel, carrying heavy battery cannons, was lost, 
and almost all the cavalry horses of Tarleton's legion, perished at sea. Tarleton supplied himself 
with others, soon after landing, by plundering the plantations near the coast. 

* During the preceding winter, Lincoln's army had dwindled to a mere handful. The repulse at 
Savannah had so disheartened the people, that very few recruits could be obtained, and when Clin- 
ton arrived, Lincoln's army did not exceed fourteen hundred men in number. The finances of the 
State were in a wretched condition, and the Tories were everywhere active and hopeful 



GIO 



THE REVOLUTION, 



[1780. 



fense. John Rutledge/ the governor of South Carolina, was clothed with all 
the powers of an absolute dictator ; and so nobly did the 
civil and military authorities labor for the public good, 
that when the invaders crossed the Ashley [March 29, 
1780], and sat down before the American works on 
Charleston Neck,'' the besieged felt strong enough to 
resist them. In the mean while, the intrenchments had 
Iicen greatly strengthened, and works of defense had 
been cast up along the wharves, and at various points 
around the harbor. Fort Moultrie^ was strongly gar- 
risoned, and Commodore Whipple^ was in command of 

a flotilla of small armed ships ha the harbor. 




GOVERNOR RUTLEDGE. 




On the 25th of March, Admiral Arbuthnot crossed Charleston bar, drove 
Whipple's little fleet to the waters near the town, and cast anchor in Five 

' John Rutledge was bom in Ireland, and came to South Carohna when a child. He was ony 
of the most active patriots of the South. After the war he was made a judge of the Supreme 
Court of the United States, and also chief justice of South Carolina He died in the year 1800. 

^ Note 1, page 29(5. ^ Note 5, page 249. 

* Abraham Whipple was bom in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1733. His early life was spent 
chiefly upon the ocean, and, in later years, he was long engaged in the merchant service. At the 
age of twent3'-seven, he was commander of a privateer, and during a single cruise, in 17 GO, he took 
twentv-three French prizes. He was engaged in the destruction of the Gmpe, in 1772 [page 223]. 
In 1775, he was appointed to the command of vessels to drive Sir James Wallace from Narragan- 
sett Bay. He was active in naval service until the fall of Charleston, when he was taken prisoner. 



1780.] SIXTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. ^^ 

Fathom Hole, not far from St. John's Island. On the morning of the 9th of 
April, he sailed up the harbor, and sustaining but trilling damage from the 
guns of Fort Moultrie, anchored within cannon-shot of the city. As Whipple 
could not contend with the strong ships, he sunk several of his vessels near the 
mouth of the Cooper River, and formed a chevaux-de-frise' to prevent the en- 
emy's ships passing beyond the town, so as to enfilade the American works on the 
Neck. Clinton, in the mean while, had erected batteries' in front of these 
works, and both commanders joined in a summons for the patriots to surrender. 
Exijecting reinforcements from the interior, the people of the beleagured city 
refused compliance, and for more than a month the siege went on.' In the 
mean while, American detachments sent out between the Cooper and Santee 
Elvers to keep open a communication with the interior, were attacked and de- 
feated by parties of British horsemen ;* and at the close of the month [April, 
1780], the city was completely environed by the foe. Cornwallis had arrived 
[April 18], from New York, with three thousand fresh troops, and all hopes 
for the patriots faded. 

The night of the 9th of May was a terrible one for Charleston. That day 
a third summons to surrender had been refused, and late in the evening a gen- 
eral cannonade commenced. Two hundred heavy guns shook the city with 
their thunders, and all night long destructive bombshells^ were hailed upon it. 
At one time the city was on fire in fiive 
different places. Nor did morning 
bring relief The enemy had deter- 
mined to take the city by storm. The 
cannonade continued all the day, and 
the fleet moved toward the town to open 
a bombardment. Further resistance 
would have been sheer madness, for the 

, • ,. 1 11 1 SIEGE OF CHARLESTON. 1780. 

destruction oi the town and the people 

seemed inevitable. At two o'clock on the morning of the 11th, a proposition 
for surrender was made to Clinton, and his guns were all silenced before day- 
light. At about noon on the 12th [May, 1780], the continental troops marched 
out, and laid down their arms, after a gallant and desperate defense for forty 
days. Lincoln and his army, with a large number of citizens, were made pris- 
oners of war. The citizens, and a great number of soldiers, were paroled.* 

He was the first who unfurled the American flag in the Thames, at London, after the war. Accom- 
panying settlers to Ohio, he became a resident of Marietta, from which he sailed, in 1800, down 
the Ohio, with pork and flour, for Havana. He died in 1819, at the age of eighty-five years. 

' Note 6, page 274. 

' On Saturday morning, the first of April, the British first broke ground in the face of eighty 
cannons and mortars on the American works. 

' General Woodford had just arrived with seven hundred Virginians, and others from North 
Carolina were reported on their way. 

* On the 14th of April, Tarleton defeated Colonel Huger on the head waters of the Cooper 
River, and killed twenty-five Americans. On the 6th of May, a party under Colonel "White, of New 
Jersey, were routed at a ferry on the Santee, with a loss of about thirty in killed, wounded, and 
prisoners. These British detachments overran the whole country below the Cooper and Santee, in 
the course of a few days. ^ Note 2, page 236. 

• A prisoner on parole is one who is left fi-ee to go anywhere within a prescribed space of couit 




312 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1T80. 
and 



Altogether, the captives amounted to between five and six thousand 
among the spoils of victory were four hundred pieces of cannon. 

The fall of Charleston, and the loss of this southern army, was a severe 




blow for the Republicans. It paralyzed their strength ; and the British com- 
manders confidently believed that the finishing stroke of the war had been 
given. It was followed by measures which, for a time prostrated South Caro- 

try, or within a city, under certain restrictions relative to conduct. Prisoners tnken in war are often 
paroled, and allowed to return to their friends, with an agreement not to take up arms. It is a 
point of honor, with a soldier, to "keep his parole," and when such a one is again taken in battle, 
during the period of his parole, he is treated not as a prisoner, but as a traitor. 

' In violation of the solemn agreement for surrender, Clinton caused a great number of the lead- 
ing men in Charleston to be seized, and carried on board prison-ships, where hundreds suffered ter- 
ribly. Many were taken to St. Augustine, and immured in the fortress there. Among other 
prominent citizens thus treated, were Lieutenant-Governor Christopher Gadsden, and David Ram- 
say, the historian, who, with about twenty others, remained in prison at St. Augustine almost eleven 
months, before they were paroled Both of these men were exceedingly active patriots. Ramsay 
was a native of Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, where he was born in 1749. He was educated at 
Princeton ; studied medicine, and became an eminent physician at Charleston. He was an efficient 
member of the Council of Safety when the Revolution broke out, and was also an esteemed legis- 
lator. He was also a member of the Continental Congress. In 1790, he published his History of 
the American Revolution. He wrote and published a Life of Washington, in 1801; a History of 
South Carolina, in 1808; and when he died, from a shot by a maniac, in 1815, he had almost com. 
pleted a History of the Unitea States. Soon after the assembling of the first National Congress, 
under the new Constitution, in 1789, Dr. Ramsay sent in a petition, asking for the passage ot a 
law lor securing tc liini and his heirs the exclusive right to vend and dispose of his books, re- 
spectively entitled, History of the Revolution in South Carolina, and ^4 History of the American 
En-oluiion. A bill for that purpose was framed and discussed. Finally, in August, it was " post- 
poned until the ne.\t Congress." A similar bill was introduced in January, 1790, and on the 30th 
of April following, the first copyright law recorded on the statute books of Congress, was 



1780.] SIXTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 31^ 

lina at the feet of rojal power. With an activity hitherto unusual for the 
British officers, Clinton took steps to extend and secure his conquest, and to 
re-establish royal power in the South. He sent out three strong detachments of 
his army to overrun the country. One under Cornwallis marched up the 
Santee toward Camden ; another under Lieutenant-colonel Cruger, was ordered 
to penetrate the country to Ninety-six,' and a third, under Lieutenant-colonel 
Brown, marched to Augusta,' in Georgia. A general truce was proclaimed, 
and a pardon to all who should accept British protection. The silence of fear 
overspread the whole country ; and mistaking this lull in the storm of war for 
permanent tranquillity, Clinton and Arbuthnot, with a large body of troops, 
sailed, on the 5th of June [1780], for New York. 

The last and most cruel blow struck by the British, was that which almost 
annihilated an American detachment under Colonel A1)raliam Buford. He had 
hastened toward Charleston for the relief of Lincoln ; but Avhcn ho heard of the 
disasters there, he commenced retreating toward North Carolina. His force 
consisted of nearly four hundred Continental infantry, a small detachment 
of Colonel Washington's cavalry, and two field-piece.?. He had evacuated 
Camden, and, in fancied security, was retreating leisurely tov/ard Charlotte, in 
North Carolina. Cornwallis resolved to strike Buford, if possible, and, for 
that purpose, he dispatched Tarleton, Avith seven hundred men, consisting ^f his 
cavalry and mounted infantry. That officer marched one hundred and five 
miles in fifty-four hours, and came up with Buford upon the Waxhaw. Impa- 
tient of delay, he had left his mounted infimtry behind, and with only his 
cavalry, he almost surrounded Buford before that officer was aware of danger. 
Tarleton demanded an immediate surrender upon the terms granted to the 
Americans at Charleston. These terms were humiliating, and Buford refused 
compliance. While the flags for conference were passing and re-passing, Tarle- 
ton, contrary to military rules, was making preparations for an assault, and 
the instant he received Buford's reply, his cavalry made a furious charge upon 
the American ranks. Having received no orders to defend themselves, and 
supposing the negotiations were yet pending, the Continentals were utterly 
dismayed by this charge. All was confusion ; and while some fired upon their 
assailants, others threw down their arm? and begged for quarter. None was 
given ; and men without arms were hewn in pieces by Tarleton' s cavalry. One 
hundred and thirteen were slain ; one hundred and fifty were so maimed as to 
be unable to travel ; and fifty-three were made prisoners, to grace the triumphal 
entry of the conqueror into Camden. Only five of the British were killed, and 
fifteen wounded. The whole of Buford's artillery, ammunition, and baggage, 
fell into the hands of the enemy. For this savage feat, Cornwallis eulogized 
Tarleton, and commended him to the ministry as worthy of special favor. It 
■was nothing less than a cold-blooded massacre ; and Tarleton'' s quarter became 
proverbial as a synonym to cruelty.* The liberal press, and all right-minded 

' Page 336. ' Page 336. 

' Stedman, one of Cornwallis's officers, and afterward an eminent English historian of tho war, 
Bays, "On this occasion, the virtue of humanity was totally forgot." 




314 THE REVOLUTION. [178a 

men in England, cried Shame ! After the battle, a large number of the 
wounded were taken to the log meeting-house of the Waxhaw Presbyterian 
Congregation, where they were tenderly cared for by those who had courage 
to remain. This blow, however, was so terrible, that fear seized the people, 
and women and children fled from their homes in dismay, to avoid falling in the 
track of the invader.' 

Brief was the lull of the storm. De Kalb" did not reach the borders ol 
South Carolina until midsummer, and then not an 
American was in arms in the lower country. Although 
Congress had confidence in the skill of De Kalb (who 
by the capture of Lincoln, became the commander-in- 
chief at the South), yet it was thought best to send 
General Gates^ thither, because of the influence of his 
name. The prospect before him was far from flattering. 
An army without strength ; a military chest without 
money ; but little public spirit in the commissary 
department ; a climate unfavorable to health ; the spirit 
GENERAL GATEe- of thc Rcpubllcans cast down ; loyalists swarming in 

every direction ; and a victorious enemy pressing to 
4)read his legions over the territory he had come to defend, were grave obsta- 
cles in the way of success. Yet Gates did not despond ; and, retaining De 
Kalb in command of his division, he prepared to march into South Carolina. 
When it was known that he was approaching, southern hearts beat high with 
hope, for they expected great things from the conqueror of Burgoyne.^ Many 
patriots, who, in their extremity, had signed "paroles" and '-protections,"* 
seeing how little solemn promises were esteemed by the conqueror, disregarded 
both, and flocked to the standard of those brave partisan leaders, Sumter, 
Marion, Pickens, and Clarke, who now called them to the field. While Gates 
and his army were approaching, these partisans were preparing the way for 
conquest. They swept over the country in small bands, striking a British 



* Among those who fled, was the widowed mother of Andrew Jackson, the seventh President 
of the United States, who, with her two sons, Robert and Andrew, took refuge in the vicinity of 
Charlotte, North Carohna. The dreadful scenes of that massacre, was the first lesson that taught 
Andrew to hate tyranny. It fired his patriotism ; and at the age of thirteen years, he entered the 
army, with his brother Robert, under Sumter. They were both made prisoners; but even while in 
the power of the British, the indomitable courage of the after man appeared in the boy. "When 
ordered to clean the muddy boots of a British officer, he proudly refused, and for his temerity 
received a sword-cut. After their release, Andrew and his brother returned to the Waxhaw set- 
tlement with thoir mother. That patriotic matron and two sons perished during the war. Her son 
Hugh was slain in battle, and Robert died of a wound which he received from a British officer while 
he was prisoner, because, liko Andrew, he refused to do menial service. Tho heroic mother, while 
on her way home from Charleston, whither she went to carry some necessaries to her friends and 
relations on board a prison-ship, was seized with prison-fever, and died. Her unknown grave i3 
somewhere between what was then called the Quarter House and Charleston. Andrew was left 
the sole survivor of the family. * Page 316. 

' Horatio Gates was a native of England, and was educated for military life. He was the first 
adjutant-general of the Continental army [note 5, page 238], and was made major-general in 1776. 
He retired to his estate in Virginia at the close of the war, and finally took up his abode in New 
Tork, where he died in 1806, at the age of seventy-eight years. 

♦ Page 281. * Note 6, page 311. 



1T80.] 



SIXTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR IN DErEN D E NC E. 



315 





GEXERAL SUMTER. 



detachment here, and a party of Tories there ; and soon, they so effectually 
alarmed the enemy in the interior, as to check the onward progress of invasion. 

General Sumter' first. appeared in power on the 
Catawba River. Already Whigs, between that and 
the Broad River, led by local officers, had assailed 
the enemy at different points. In the mean while 
Sumter had collected a considerable force, and on 
the 30th of July, he attacked a British post at Rocky 
Mount, on the Catawba. lie was repulsed, but not 
disheartened. He immediately crossed the river, and 
at Hanging-rock, a few miles eastward, he fell upon 
and dispersed a large body of British and Tories, on 
the 6th of August. Through the folly of his men, 
he did not secure a victory. They commenced plundering, and drinking the 
liquors found in the camp, after they had secured it, and becoming into.xicated, 
were unable to complete the triumph. Yet the British dared not follow Sumter 
in his slow retreat. Marion, at the same time, was smiting the enemy, with 
sudden and fierce blows, among the swamps of the lower country, on the 
borders of the Pedee. Pickens was annoying Cruger in the neighborhood of 
the Saluda ; and Clarke was calling for the patriots along the Savannah, Ogee- 
chee, and Alatamaha, to drive Brown'^ from Augusta. 

General Clinton left Earl Cornwallis in the chief command of the British 
army at the South, and his troops on the Santee were intrusted to Lord Raw- 
don, an active and meritorious officer. When that general heard of the approach 
of Gates, he gathered all his available forces at Camden, where he was soon joined 
by the earl. Rumor had greatly magnified the number of the army under Gates. 
The loyalists became alarmed, and the patriots took courage. He came down 
from the hill country, through Lancaster district, and took post at Clermont, a 
few miles north of Camden. Feeling certain of victory, he marched from his 
camp on the night of the 15th of August, to surprise the British at Camden. 
W^ithout being aware of this movement, Cornwallis and Rawdon advanced at 
the same hour to surprise the Americans. A little after 
midnight the belligerents met [August 16, 1780], near San- 
ders's Creek, about seven miles north of Camden, on the Lan- 
caster road. The sand was so deep that the footsteps of the 
approaching armies could not be heard by each other. They 
came together in the dark, almost noiselessly, and both were 
equally surprised. A slight skirmish between the vanguards 
ensued, and early in the morning a general battle began. 
After a desperate struggle with an overwhelming force, the 
Americans were compelled to yield to the British bayonets in 




S.VXDERSS CREEK. 



' Thomas Sumter was a native of South Oarohna, and was early ha the field. Ill health com- 
pelled him to leave the army just before the close of the war. in 1781. He was afterward a mem- 
ber of the National Congress, and died on the High Hills of Santee [page 337], in 183'2, at tha 
^'ie of ninety-eight years. a p^gg ^^q 



316 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1780. 




BARON DE KALB. 



front, and the sabres of Tarleton's dragoons on their flanks. The rout 
became general. The militia fell in great numbers, under the heavj blows 
from the British cavalrj ; and for more than two miles, along the line of 
their retreat, the open wood was strewn Avith the dead and dying. Arms, artil- 
lery, horses, and baggage, Avere scattered in every direction. More than a third 
of the continental troops were killed ; and the entire loss of 
the Americans, in killed, Avounded, and prisoners, was 
about a thousand men, besides all of their artillery and 
ammunition, and a greater portion of their baggage and 
stores.' The British loss Avas three hundred and tAAenty- 
fiA^e. Among the killed was the brave Baron de Kalb,* 
whose remains Avere buried at Camden, and there they 
yet lie, under a neat monument, the corner-stone of 
which was laid by La Fayette in 1825.^ 

Having vainly endeaA^ored to rally his flying troops, 
Gates fled to Charlotte," eighty miles distant. There he continued to be 
joined by officers and men, and he began to hope that another army might be 
speedily collected. But Avhen, a few days after his OAvn defeat, he received intel- 
ligence that Sumter's fsrce had been nearly annihilated by Tarleton' near the 
CataAvba, he almost despaired. That event Avas a sad one 
for the republicans. Sumter had been ordered, by Gates, 
to intercept a British detachment Avhich was couA^eying 
stores for the main army, from Ninety-Six. ° He was 
joined by other troops sent to assist him, and they cap- 
tured forty-four Avagons loaded Avith clothing, and made a 
number of pi-isoners. On hearing of the defeat of Gates, 
Sumter continued his march up the CataAvba. and on the 
18th [August, 1780] he encamped near the mouth of 
the Fishing Creek. There he was surprised by Tarleton, and his troops were 
routed Avith great slaughter. More than fifty were killed, and three hundred 
were made prisoners. All the booty captured by the Americans fell into the 
hands of Tarleton. Sumter escaped, but Avas stripped of poAver. 

^\ ith the dispersion of Gates's army, and Sumter's brave band, the victory 
of the British A\'as again complete ; and at the close of summer, there Avere no 




COLOXEL TARLETON. 



' General Gates had felt so certain of victory, that he had made no provisions for a retreat, or 
the salvation of his stores in the rear. His troops were scattered in all directions, and he, appar- 
ently panic-stricken by tlie terrible blow, fled, almost alone, to Charlotte. Even now [1831] bul- 
lets are found in the old pine-trees on the route of their retreat. Gates did indeed, as General 
Charles Lee predicted he would, when he heard of his appointment to the command of the south- 
em army, "exchange his northern laurels for southern willows." 

^ De Kalb was a native of Alsace, a German province ceded to France. He had been in Amer- 
ica as a secret French agent, about fifteen years before. He came to America with La Fayette in 
1T77, and Congress commissioned him a major-general. He died of his wounds at Camden, three 
days after the battle. ^ Page 4.5.3. * Page 237. 

^ Tarleton was one of the most active and unscrupulous officers of the British army. He was 
distinguished for his abilities and cruolties during the southern campaigns of 1780-81. He was 
born in Liverpool, in 17.54. He married a daughter of the Duke of Ancaster, in 1798, and was 
afterward made a major-generaL * Page 336. 



1780.] SIXTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 317 

republicans in arms in South Carolina, except Marion and his men. Withm 
three months [May 12 to August 16 j, two American armies had been annihil- 
ated, and one of the most formidable partisan corps (Sumter's) scattered to the 
winds. 




The exploits of INIarion* and his men, form the materials of one of the most 
interesting chapters in the history of our War for Independence. He was in 
Charleston during the long siege, but having been disabled by an accident," he 
had retired to the country, and was not among the prisoners when the city 
passed in the possession of the British.^ He was therefore untrammeled by any 
parole, and as soon as he was able, he mounted his horse, and took the field. 
With a few ragged followers, equal in grotesque appearance to any Falstaff 



* Francis Marion was a descendant of a Huguenot [page 49] settler, and was bom near George- 
town, South Carolina, in 1732. His first military lessons were learned in tlie war witli the Cliero- 
kecG [page 204], in 17G1. He entered tlie army at the commencement of the Revolution, and was 
one of the bravest and most useful of all the partisan officers at the South. He was also a member 
of '-ho South Carolina Legislature, during, and after the war. He died at his home, near Eutaw 
Springs, on his beloved Santee, in 1795, in the sixty-third year of his age. 

Marion was dining with some friends at a house in Tradd-street, Charleston, when, on an at- 
tempt being made to cause him to drink wine, contrary to his practice and desire, he leaped from a 
window, and sprained his ankle. Tlie Americans yet kept the country toward the Santee, open, 
and Marion was couveyed to his home. ' Page 311. 



318 THE REVOLUTION. [1780. 

ever saw/ he was annoying the Tories in the neighborhood of the Pedee, when 
Gates was moving southward ; and just before the battle at Camden, he ap- 
peared in Gates's camp. The proud general would have treated him with con- 
tempt, had not Governor Rutledge," then in the camp, known the steriing 
worth of the man before them. While Marion was there, the people of the 
Williamsburg district, who had arisen in arms, sent for him to be their com- 
mander. Governor Rutledge gave him the commission of a brigadier on the 
spot ; and soon afterward, Marion organized that noted hrigade^ which per- 
formed such wonderful exploits among the swamps, the broad savannahs, and 
by the water-courses of the South. It was this motley brigade, only, that 
appeared in the field, and defied British power, after the dispersion of Gates's 
^rmy at Camden. 

Had Cornwallis been governed by good judgment and humanity, the con- 
quest of South Carolina might have been permanent, 
for the State swarmed with Tories, and the Republic- 
ans were wearied with the unequal contest. But he 
was governed by a foolish and wicked policy, and pro- 
ceeded to establish royal authority by the most severe 
measures. Instead of winning the respect of the people 
h^ wisdom and clemency, he thought to subdue them 
by cruelty. Private riglits were trampled under foot, 
and social organization was superseded by the iron rule 
T^r.T. ^^T,.T„r.TTx. of military despotism.^ His measures created the most 

LORD OOKN \v ALLIo. »/ x 

bitter hatred; and hundreds of patriots, who might 
have been conciliated, were goaded into active warfare by the lash of military 
power. Everywhere the people thirsted for vengeance, and only awaited the 
call of leaders, to rally and strike again for homes and freedom. 

Now, feeling confident of his power in South Carolina, Cornwallis* prepared 
to invade the North State. Early in September he proceeded with his army 
to Charlotte,^ while detachments were sent out in various directions to awe the 
Republicans and encourage the loyalists. While Tarleton, with his legion, 



* Colonel Otho IT. WiUiams said of his appearance then, tliat his followers were " distinguished 
by small leathern caps, and the wretchedness of their attire. Their number did not exceed twenty 
men and boys, some white, some black, and aU mounted, but most of them miserably equipped. 
Their appearance was, in fact, so burlesque, that it was with much difficulty the diversion of the 
regular soldiery was restrained by the officers ; and the general himself [Gates] was glad of an op- 
portunity of detaching Colonel Marion, at his own instance, toward the interior of South Carolina, 
with orders to watchthe motions of the enemy, and furnish intelligence." 

" Page 310. 

' He issued cruel orders to his subalterns. They were directed to hang every mmtia-man who 
had once served in Loyalist corps, but were now found in arms against the king. Many who had 
submitted to Clinton [page 313], and accepted protection, and had remained at home quietly during 
the recent revo:t, were imprisoned, their property taken from them or destroyed, and their families 
treated witli the utmost rioror. See note 3, page 337. 

> " Charles, Earl Cornwallis, was born, in Suffolk, England, in 1738. He was educated for mili- 
tary life, and commenced his career in 1759. Afler the Revolution in America, he was made gov- 
ernor-general of India [note 2, page 224], then lord-lieutenant of Ireland, and again governor of 
India. Ho died near Benares, East Indies, in 1805. 

* His advanced coqis were attacked by the Americans under Colonel Davie, oa their arrival at 
Charlotte, but after a severe skirmis]\ the patriots were repulsed. 




1180.] SIXTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 319 

was operating on the east side of the Catawha, Major Patrick Ferguson was 
sent to embody the militia who favored the king, among the mountains west of 
the Broad River. Manj profligate and worthless men joined his standard, and 
on the first of October, 1780, he crossed the Broad River at the Cherokee ford, 
in Yorkville district, and encamped among the hills of King's Mountain, with 
about fifteen hundred men. Several corps of Whig militia united to oppose 
him,' and on the 7th of October, they fell upon his camp on King's Mountain, 
there, a cluster of high, Avooded, gravelly hills, about two miles below the 
southern line of North Carolina. A very severe engagement ensued, and the 
British were totally defeated. Ferguson was slain," and three hundred of his 
men were killed and wounded. The spoils of victory, which cost the Americans 
eighty-eigh men, were eight hundred prisoners, and fifteen hundred stand of 
arms. This defeat was to Cornwallis, what the aifair at Bennington^ was to 
Burgoyne, and it gave the Republicans hope. 

Nearer the sea- board, in the mean while, the patriots were daily gaining 
strength. Marion and his men* were striking the banding Tories here and 
there, and annoying British outposts continually ; while Colonel Pickens and 
Clarke were hourly augmenting their forces in Gedrgia and south-western 
Carolina. Sumter, too, undismayed by his recent defeat, again appeared in the 
field ;^ and other leaders were coming forth between the Yadkin and Broad 
Rivers. Alarmed by the defeat of Ferguson, and these demonstrations on flank 
and rear, Cornwallis withdrew [October 14] to South Carolina, and toward the 
close of October [27th], made his head quarters at Winnsborough, midway 
between the Broad and Catawba Rivers, in Fairfield district. Here he 
remained until called to the pursuit of Greene,^ a few weeks later. 

Victory after victory was achieved by Marion and his brigade, until late in 
October, when they pushed forward to assail the British post at Georgetown, 
for the purpose of obtaining necessary supplies. Hitherto Marion had confined 
his operations to forays upon British and Tories ; now he undertook a more 

■ These were commanded by Colonels "William Campbell, Isaac Shelby, Benjamin Cleveland, 
John Sevier, Joseph Winston, Charles McDowell, and James Williams. Their united forces 
amounted to nearly eighteen hundred men. 

^ On the spot where Ferguson was slain, a plain stone has been erected to the memory of that 
officer, and of Americans who were kOled. The following inscriptions upon the stone, give the 
names: North side. — "Sacred to the memory of Major William Chronicle, Captain John Mat- 
tocks, William Robb, and John Boyd, who were killed here fighting in defense of America, on 
the seventh of October, 1780." South side. — "Colonel Ferguson, an oflicer belonging to his Britan- 
nic majesty, was here defeated and killed." Ferguson's rank is incorrectly given, on the monument. 
He was only a major ; but his good conduct was placing him in the way of speedy promotion. He 
was a son of the eminent Scotch jurist, James Ferguson, and came to America in 1777. He was 
in the battle on the Brandywine, in the autumn of that year [page 273], and accompanied Sir Henry 
Clinton to South Carolina [page 306] at the close of 1779. ' Page 277. " Page 317. 

^ Sumter collected a small force in the vicinity of Charlotte, and' returned to South Carolina. 
F(>r some weeks he annoyed the British and Tories very much, and Lord Cornwallis, who called him 
The Carolina Gamt Cock, used gi-eat endeavors to crush him. On the night of the 12th of Noveir' 
ber, Major Wemyss, at the head of a British detachment, fell upon him near the Broad River, but 
w.'us repul&ed. l^Iiglit days afterward he had a severe engagement with Tarleton, at Blackstock's 
r'intation- on the Tyger River, in Union district. He had now been joined by some Georgians 
u>-aer Colonels Clarke and Twiggs. The British were repulsed, with a loss, in killed and wounded, 
of about three hundred. The Americans lost only three killed and five wounded. Sumter was 
among the latter, and he was detained from the field several months, by his wounds. 

• Page 332. 



320 THE REVOLUTION. [1730. 

serious business. The garrison was on the alert, and in a severe skirmish with 
a large party near the town, the Partisan was repulsed. lie then retired to 
Snow's Island, at the confluence of Lynch's Creek and the Pedee, where he 
fixed his camp, and secured it by such works of art as the absence of natural 
defenses required. It Avas chiefly high river swamp, dry, and covered with a 
heavy forest, filled with game. From that island camp, Marion sent out and 
led detachments as occasion required ; and for many weeks, expeditions which 
accomplished wonderful results, emanated from that point. Their leader seemed 
to be possessed of ubiquitous powers, for he struck blows at difierent points in 
rapid succession. The British became thoroughly alarmed, and the destruction 
of his camp became, with them, an object of vital importance.' That work was 
accomplished in the spring of 1781, when a party of Tories penetrated to 
Marion's camp, during his absence, dispersed the little garrison, destroyed the pro- 
visions and stores found there, and then fled. The Partisan was not disheartened 
by this misfortune, but pursued the marauder some distance, and then wheeling, 
he hastened through the then overflowed swamps to confront Colonel Watson, 
who was in motion with a body of fresh troops, in the vicinity of the Pedee. 

While these events were progressing at the South, others of great import- 
ance were transpiring at the North. As we have observed,'' military operations 
were almost suspended in this region during the year, and there were no oSens- 
ive movements worthy of notice, except an invasion of New Jersey, in June. 
On the 6th of that month (before the arrival of Clinton from Charleston), Knyp- 
hausen^ dispatched General Matthews from Staten Island, with about five 
thousand men, to penetrate New Jersey. They took possession of Elizabeth- 
town [June 7], and burned Connecticut Farms (then a hamlet, and now the 
village of Utiioti), on the road from' Elizabethtown to Springfield. When the 
invaders arrived at the latter place, they met detachments which came down 
from Washington's camp at Morristown, and by them were driven back to the 
coast, where they remained a fortnight. In the mean while Clinton arrived, 
and joining Matthews with additional troops [June 22], endeavored to draw 
Washington into a general battle, or to capture his stores at Morristown. 
Feigning an expedition to the Highlands, Clinton deceived Washington, who, 
with a considerable force, marched in that direction, leaving General Greene in 
command at Springfield. Perceiving the success of his stratagem, • he, with 
Knyphausen, marched upon Greene, witn c-bout five thousand infantry, a con- 
siderable body of cavalry and almost twenty pieces of artillery. After a severe 

* Here was the scene of the interview between Marion and a young British officer from George- 
town, so well remembered by tradition, and so well delineated by the pen of Simms and the pencil 
of White. The officer who came to treat respecting prisoners, was led blindfolded to the camp of 
Marion. There he first saw the diminutive Ibrm of the great partisan leader, and around him, in 
groups, were his followers, lounging beneath magnificent trees draped with moss. When their business 
was concluded, Marion invited the young Briton to dine with him. lie remained, and to his utter 
astonishment he saw some roasted potatoes brought forward on a piece of bark, of which the 
general partook freely, and invited his guest to do the same. "Surely, general," said the officer, 
"this can not be your ordinary fare!" "Indeed it is," replied Marion, "and we are fortunate on 
this occasion, entertaining company, to have more than our usual allowance." It is related that 
the young officer gave up his commission on his return, declaring that such a people could not be, 
aad ought not to be subdued. ^ Page 309. ' Page 259. 




*^1 



Marion's Encampjien-t ox the Pedeb. 



1780.] 



SIXTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



323 



skirmish at Springfield, the British were defeated [June 23, 1780], and setting 
fire to the village, they retreated, and passed over to Staten Island. 

Good news for the Americans canie from the East, a few days after this 
invasion. It was that of the arrival, at Newport, Rhode Island, on the 10th 
of July [1780], of a powerful French fleet, under Admiral Ternay, bearing 
six thousand land troops under the Count de Rochambeau. This expedition 
had been expected for some time, it having sailed from Brest early in April 




I'he whole matter had been arranged with the French government by La Fay- 
ette, who had returned from France in jNIay, and brought the glad tidings to 
the Americans. With wise forethought, the relation between Washington and 
Rochambeau had been settled by the French government. In order to prevent 
any difficulties in relation to command, l^etween the American and French offi- 
cers, the king commissioned Washington a lieutenant-general of the empire. 
This allowed him to take precedence of Rochambeau, and made him commander- 
in -chief of the allied armies. Soon after his arrival, Rochambeau, by appoint- 
ment, met Washington at Hartford, in Connecticut, to confer upon their future 
movements. The season being so far advanced, that it was thought imprudent 
for the French army to enter upon active duties during the current campaign, it 



324 THE REVOLUTION. [llsa 

was determined to have the main bodj of it remain in camp, on Rhode Island, 
while the cavalry should be cantoned at Lebanon, in Connecticut, the place of 
residence of Jonathan Trumbull, governor of that State. That eminent man 
was the only chief magistrate of a colony who retained his oflSce after the change 
from royal to Republican rule ; and throughout the war, he was one of the 
most efficient of the civil officers among the patriots.' 

The arrival of the French caused Clinton to be more circumspect in his 
movements, and he made no further attempts to entice Washington to fight. 
Yet he was endeavoring to accomplish by his own strategy, and the treason of an 
American officer, what he could not achieve by force. At different times during 
the war, the British offic'als in America had tampered, directly or indirectly, 
with some Americans, supposed to be possessed of easy virtue, but it was late in 
the contest before one could be found who was wicked enough to be a traitor. 
Finally, a recreant to the claims of patriotism appeared, and while the French 
army were landing upon Rhode Island, and were preparing for winter quarters 
there, Clinton was bargaining with Benedict Arnold for the strong military 
post of West Point,'' and its dependencies among the Hudson Highlands, and 
with it the liberties of America, if possible. 

Arnold was a brave soldier, but a bad man.^ He fought nobly for freedom, 
from the beginning of the war, until 1778, when his passions gained the mas- 
tery over his judgment and conscience. Impulsive, vindictive, and unscrupu- 
lous, he was personally unpopular, and was seldom without a quarrel with some 
of his companions-in-arms. Soon after his appointment to the command at 
Philadelphia,* he Avas married to the beautiful young daughter of Edward 
Shippen, one of the leading loyalists of that city. He lived in splendor, at an 
expense far beyond his income. To meet the demands of increasing creditors, 
he engaged in fraudulent acts which made him hated by the public, and caused 
charges of dishonesty and malpractices in office to be preferred against him, 
before the Continental Conf;;rc;:s. A court-martial, appointed to try him, con-' 

' Jonathan Trumbull was born at Lebanon, Connecticut, in June, 1710, and was educated at 
Harvard CoUege. He prepared for the ministry, but finally became a merchant. He was a mem- 
ber of the Connecticut Assembly at the age of twenty-three years. He was ohosen governor of 
Connecticut in 1769, and for fourteen consecutive years he was elected to that ofiice. He died at 
Lebanon, in August, 1785, at the age of seventy-five years. See page 323. 

^ During the spring and summer of 1778, the passes of the Hudson Highlands were much 
strengthened. A strong redoubt called Fort Clinton (in honor of George Clinton, then governor of 
New^York), was erected on tlie extreme end of the promontory of West Point. Otlier redoubts 
were erected in the rear ; and upon Mount Independence, five hundred feet above the Point, the- 
strong fortress of Fort Putnam was built, whose gray ruitis are yet visible. Besides these, an 
enormous iron chain, each link weighing more than one hundred pounds, was stretched across the 
Hudson at West Point, to keep British ships from ascending the river. It was floated upon timbers, 
■linked together with iron, and made a very strong obstruction. Two of these floats, with the con- 
necting links, are preserved at Washington's Head Quarters, at Newburgh; and several links of the 
great chain mav be seen on the parade ground, at West Point. 

* While yet a mere youth, he attempted murder. A young Frenchman was an accepted 
suitor of Arnold's sister. The young tyrant (for Arnold was always a despot among his play-fellows) 
disliked him, and when he could not persuade his sister to discard him, ho declared he would shoot 
the Frenchman if he ever entered the house again. The opportunity soon occurred, and Arnold 
discharged a loaded pistol at him, as he escaped through a window. The young man left the place 
forever, and Hannah Arnold lived the life of a maiden. Arnold and the Frenchman afterward met. 
at Honduras, and fought a duel, in wliich the Frenchman was severely wounded. 

* Note 3, page 287. 



SIXTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



825 



victed him, but sentenced him to a reprimand only. Although Washington 
performed that duty with the utmost delicacy, Arnold felt the disgrace. It 
awakened vengeful feelings which, operating with the pressure of debt, made him 
listen with complacency to the suggestions of a bad nature. He made treason- 
able overtures to Sir Henry Clinton, and by a correspondence of several months 
(under an assumed name, and with propositions couched in commercial phrases) 
with the accomplished Major Andre,' Clinton's adjutant-general, he bargained 
with the British commander to betray West Point and its dependencies into his 
hands. For this service he was to receive a brigadier's commission, and fifty 
thousand dollars in cash. 




The traitor managed the affair very adroitly. For a long time, Washington 
had been suspicious of Arnold's integrity, but was unwilling to believe him 
capable of treason. Under pretense of having private business in Connecticut, 
Arnold left Philadelphia, passed through Washington's camp on the Hudson, 
and on his return, he suggested to the chief that he would be glad to have com- 
mand of West Point. He made many patriotic professions, and his desires were 
gratified. He was appointed to the command of that post, in August, 1780, 
and then all his thoughts were turned to the one great object of the betrayal of 



' Arnold's hand-writing was disguised, and he signed his letters Gusiavus. Andre's letters 
Were signed John Anderson. A correspondence was carried on between them for more than a 
year. 



326 THE revolution:. [1780. 

his trust. The time chosen for the consummation of his treasonable designs, 
was when Washington was absent, in September, in conference with the French. 
ofiBcers at Hartford, Connecticut.' Up to the time of his taking command of 
"West Point, Arnold and Andre had negotiated in writing. They had never 
met, but now a personal conference was necessary. For that purpose, Andre 
went up the Hudson in the sloop of war, Vulture, which anchored off Teller's 
Point, just above the mouth of the Croton River. Andre was taken ashore, 
near Haverstraw, on the west side of the Hudson, where, by previous appoint- 
ment, he met Arnold. Before they parted [Sept. 22, 1780], the whole matter 
was arranged. Clinton was to sail up the river with a strong force, and 
after a show of resistance, Arnold was to surrender West Point and its depend- 
encies into his hands. But all did not work well. Some Americans dragged 
an old iron six-pound cannon (yet preserved at Sing Sing) to the end of Teller's 
Point, and with it so galled the Vulture, that she was driven from her anchor- 
age, and, dropping down the river, disappeared from Andre's view. He was 
consequently compelled to cross to the eastern side of the Hudson in disguise, 
and make his way toward New York, by land. At Tarrytown, twenty-seven 
miles from the city, he was stopped [Sept. 23] and searched by three young 
mdlitia men,'^ who, finding papers concealed in his boots,^ took him to the near- 
est American post. Colonel Jameson, the commander, could not seem to com- 
prehend the matter, and unwisely allowed Andre to send a letter to Arnold, 
then at his quarters opposite West Point. The alarmed and warned traitor im- 
mediately fled down the river in his barge, and escaped to the Vulture in safety, 
leaving behind him his young wife and infint son, who were kindly treated by 
Washington.* 

The unfortunate INIajor Andre was tried and found guilty as a spy, and was 
hanged on the 2d of October, 1780, at Tappan opposite Tarrytown, while the real 
miscreant escaped. Strenuous efforts were made to gain possession of Arnold, and 
save Andre, but they failed,^ and that accomplished officer, betrayed by circum- 
stances, as he said in a letter to Washington, " into the vile condition of au 
enemy in disguise," suffered more because of the sins of others, than of his own. 
Washington would have spared Andre, if the stern rules of war had permitted. 

' Page 323. 

- John Paulding, David Williams, and Isaac Yan "Wart, all residents of Westchester county. 
Andre offered them large bribes if they would allow him to pass, but they refused, and thus saved 
their country from ruin. 

* These papers are well preserved. After being in private hands more than seventy years, they 
were purchased, and deposited in the New York State Library, in 1853. 

* Washington returned from Hartford on the very morning of Arnold's escape, and reached hia 
quarters (yet standing opposite West Point) just after the traitor had left. The evidences of his 
treason were there, and officers were sent in pursuit, but in vain. Washington sent the wife and 
son of Arnold to ISIew York, whither the traitor was conveyed by the Vulture. That infant, v.-ho 
was named James Robertson Arnold, was born at West Point. He became a distinguished officer 
in the British army, having passed through all the grades of office, from lieutenant. On the aocessioa 
of Queen Victoria, in 1835, he was made one of her aids-de-camp, and rose to the rank of major- 
general, with the badge of a Knight of the Royal Hanoverian Guelphic Order. 

* Serjeant Champe, of Lee's legion [page 333], went into New York City, in the disguise of a 
deserter, joined the corps which had been placed under Arnold's command, and had every thing 
arranged for carrying off the traitor, in a boat, to the New Jersey sliore. On the very day when he 
was to execute his scheme, at night, Arnold's corps were ordered to Virginia, and Champe was. 
compelled to accompany it. There he escaped, and johied Lee in the Carolinas. 




1781.] SEVENTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 327 

The young soldier has always been more pitied than blamed ; while the name 
of Arnold will ever be regarded with the bitterest scorn. ' Although he did not 
accomplish his wicked schemes, he received the stipulated reward for his treason- 
able services. And history, too, has given him its reward of recorded shame, 
while those who were instrumental in securing 
Andre, and with him the evidences of the foul 
treason, are honored by the nation with its ever- 
lasting gratitude. Thankful for deliverance from 
the dangers of treason, Congress voted [Nov. 3, 
1780] each of the three young militia men, a sil- 
ver medal and a pension of two hundred dollars a 
year, for life. And marble monuments have been 

*' ' , . • q 1 -1 1 • r» CAPTOR'S MEDAL.'' 

erected to their memories ; while the sentiment ot 

sympathy for the unfortunate Andre, has also caused a memorial to him, to be 

erected at Tarrytown, upon the spot where he was executed. 

And now another year drew to a close, and yet the patriots were not sub- 
dued. England had already expended vast treasures and much blood in en- 
deavors to subjugate them ; and, on account of the rebellion, had involved 
herself in open war with France and Spain. Notwithstanding all this, and 
unmindful of the fact that a large French land and naval armament was already 
on the American shores,* she seemed to acquire fresh vigor as every new ob- 
stacle presented itself And when the British ministry learned that Holland, 
the maritime rival of England, was secretly negotiating a treaty with the United 
States for loans of money and other assistance, they caused a declaration of war 
against that government to be immediately proclaimed [Dec. 20, 1780], and 
procured from Parliament immense appropriations of men and money, ships and 
stores, to sustain the power of Great Britain on land and sea. 



CHAPTER YIII. 

SEVENTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. [1781.] 

One of the noblest displays of true patriotism, for which the war for Inde- 
pendence was so remarkable, signalized the opening of the year 1781. Year 

' Benedict Araold was born in Norwich, Connecticut, in January, 17.30. He was bred to tho 
business of an apothecary, and for some time carried on that, with booJcselhng, in New Haven. 
We have already met him in his career during tho war, up to the time of his treason. We sliall 
meet him again, in Virginia [page 330], with tl)e enemy. At the close of the war, he went to En- 
gland, then to Nova Scotia, but he was everywliere despised. He died in London, in June, IS il, 
where, just three years afterward, his wife also died. 

* On one s de is the word "Fidelity," and on the other, " Vincit amor patriae" — "Tl^e love 
of country conquers." 

^ To Paulding, in St. Peter's church-yard, about two miles from Peekskill, and to Van Wart in 
Greenburg church-yard, a little more than th.it distance from Tarrytown. Williams was buried ia 
Schoharie county, where a monument is about to be erected to his memorv. * Page 323. 



g23 THE REVOLUTION. [1781. 

after year the soiuiers had suffered every privation, from lack of money and 
clothing. Faction had now corrupted the Continental Congress, and the public 
welfare suffered on account of the tardiness of that body in the performance of 
its legitimate duties. Continental money had become almost worthless,' and 
the pay of officers and men was greatly in arrears. The frequent promises of 
Congress had been as frequently unfulfilled, and the common soldiers had cause 
to be dissatisfied with the illiberal interpretation which their officers gave to 
the terms of enlistment." They had asked in vain for aid; and finally, on the 
first day of January, 1781, thirteen hundred of the Pennsylvania line, whose 
time, as they understood it, had expired, left the camp at Morristown,^ with the 
avowed determination of marching to Philadelphia, and in person demanding 
justice from the national legislature. General Wayne* was in command of the 
Pennsjdvania troops, and was much beloved by them. He exerted all his influ- 
ence, by threats and persuasions, to bring them back to duty until their griev- 
ances should be redressed. They would not listen to his remonstrances ; and, 
on cocking his pistol, they presented their bayonets to his breast, saying, "We 
respect and love you ; often have you led us into the field of battle, but we are 
no longer under your command ; wo Avarn you to be on your guard ; if you fire 
your pistol, or attempt to enforce your commands, we shall put you instantly 
to death." Wayne appealed to their patriotism; they pointed to the impo- 
sitions of Congress. He reminded them of the strength their conduct would 
give to the enemy ; they exhibited their tattered garments and emaciated forms. 
They avowed their willingness to support the cause of freedom, for it was dear 
to their hearts, if adequate provision could be made for their comfort, and then 
boldly reiterated their intention to march directly to Philadelphia, and demand 
from Congress a redress of their grievances. 

Finding threats and persuasions useless, Wayne concluded to accompany 
the mutineers. When they reached Princeton, they presented the general with 
a written programme of their demands. It appeared reasonable ; but not being 
authorized to promise them any thing, the matter was referred to Congress. 
That body immediately appointed a commission to confer with the insurgents. 
The result Avas a compliance with their just demands, and the disbanding of a 
large part of the Pennsylvania line, for the winter, which was filled by new 
recruits in the spring.^ 

^ Page 245. Thirty dollars in paper were then worth only one in silver. 

* The terms, as expressed, were, that they should "serve for three years, or during the war;" 
that is, for three years if the war continued, or be discharged sooner if the war should end sooner. 
The officers claimed that they were bound to serve as long as the war should continue. 

' The head-quarters of "Washington were now at New Windsor, just above the Hudson High- 
lands. The Pennsylvania troops were cantoned at Morristown, New Jersey ; and the New Jersey 
troops were at Pompton, in the same State. * Page 298. 

* Intelligence of this revolt reached "Washington and Sir Henry Clinton on the same day. 
"Washington took measures immediately to suppress the mutiny, and prevent the bad influence of its 
example. Sir Henry Clinton, mistaking the spirit of the mutineers, thought to gain great advantage 
by the event. He dispatched two emissaries, a British sergeant, and a New Jersey Tory named 
Ogden, to the insurgents, with the written offer that, on laying down their arms and marching to 
New York, they should receive their arrearages, and the amount of the depreciation of the Conti- 
nental currency, in hard cash ; that they should be well clothed, have a free pardon for all past 
offenses, and be taken under the protection of the British government; and that no military service 



i781.] SEVENTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 329 

On the 18tli of January, a portion of the New Jersey line, at Pompton, 
followed the example of their comrades at Morristown. The mutiny was soon 
quelled [January 27 J, but by harsher means than Wayne had employed. Gen- 
eral Robert Howe' was sent by Washington, Avith five hundred men, to restore 
order. Two of the ringleaders were hanged, and the remainder quietly sub- 
mitted. These events had a salutary effect. They aroused Congress and the 
people to the necessity of more efiicient measures for the support of the army. 
Taxes were imposed and cheerfully paid ; a special agent, sent abroad to obtain 
loans, was quite successful," and a national bank' was established at Philadel- 
phia, and placed under the charge of Robert jSIorris,* to whose superintendence 
Congress had recently intrusted the public Treasury. To his efforts and finan- 
cial credit, the country was indebted for the means to commence offensive opera- 
tions in the spring of 1781. He collected the taxes, and by the free use of his 
ample private fortune, and his public credit, he supplied the army with flour 
and other necessaries, and doubtless prevented their disbanding by their own 
act. 

Let us now turn our attention to events in the South. While half-starved, 
half-naked troops Avere making such noble displays of patriotism amid the snows 

should be required of them, unless voluntarily offered. Sir Henry requested them to appoint agents 
to treat with his and adjust the terms of a treaty ; aud, not doubting the success of his plans, he 
wont to Staten Island himself, with a large body of troops, to act as circumstances might require. 
Like his masters at home, he entirely misapprehended the spirit and the incentives to action of the 
American soldiers. They were not mercenary — not soldiers by profession, lighting merely for hire. 
Tlie protection of their homes, their wives and little ones, and the defense of holy principles, which 
their general intelliganca understood and appreciated, formed the motive-power and the bond of union 
of the American army ; and the soldier's money stipend was the least attractive of all the induce- 
msnts which urged him to take up arms. Yet as it was necessary to his comfort, and even his 
existence, th3 want of it afforded a just pretext for the assumption of powers delegated to a few. 
The mutiny was a democratic movement; and, while the patriot L-lt justified in using his weapons 
to redress grievances, he still looked ^vith horror upon the armed oppressors of his countrj-, and 
regarded the act and stain of treason, under any circumstances, as worse than the infliction of death. 
Clinton's proposals were, therefore, rejected with disdain. "See, comrades," said one of the leaders, 
" he takes us for traitors. Let us show him that the American army can furnish but one Arnold, 
and that America has no truer friends than we." They immediately seized the emissaries, who, 
being delivered, with Clinton's papers, into the hands of Wayne, were tried and executed as spies, 
and the reward which had been offered for their apprehension was tendered to the mutineers who 
seized them. They sealed the pledge of their patriotism by nobly refusing it, saying, "Necessity 
wrung from us the act of demanding justice from Congress, but we desire no reward for doing our 
duty to our bleeding country !" A committee of Congress, appointed to report on the condition of 
the army, said, a short time previous to this event, that it was " unpaid for five months ; that it 
seldom had more thin six days' provisions in advance, and was, on several occasions, for sundry 
successive days, without meat ; that tho medical department had neither sugar, coffee, tea, choco- 
late, wine, nor spirituous liquors of any kind, and that every department of the army was without 
money, and had not even the shadow of credit left." ' Page 292. 

" Colonel John Laurens [See page 348], a son of Henry Laurens [page 348], had been sent 
to France to ask for aid. While earnestly pressing his suit, with Vergennes, the French minister, 
one day, that official said, that the king had every disposition to favor the United States. This 
patronizing expression kindled the indignation of the young diplomatist, and he replied with empha- 
sis, " Favor, sir ! The respect which I owe to ray country will not admit the term. Say that the 
obligation is mutual, and I will acknowledge the obligation. But, as the last argument I shall offer 
to your Excellency, the sword which I now wear in defense of France, as well as my own country, 
unless the succor I solicit is immediately accorded, I may be compelled, within a short time, to draw 
against France, as a British subject." This had the effect intended. The French dreaded a recon- 
ciliation of the colonies with Great Britain, and soon a subsidy of one million two hundred thousand 
dollars, and a further sum, as a loan, was granted. The French minister also gave a guaranty tor 
a Dutch loan of aliout two millions of dollars. 

^ This was called the Bank of North America, and was the first institution of the kind estab- 
lished m this country. * Page 264. 



330 THE REVOLUTION. [1781. 

of New Jersey, Arnold, the arch-traitor,' now engaged in the service of his 
rojal master, was commencing a series of depredations upon lower Virginia, 
with about sixteen hundred British and Tory troops, and a few armed vessels. 
He arrived at Hampton Roads' on the 30th of December. Anxious to distin- 
guish himself, he pushed up the James River, and after destroying [January 5, 
1781] a large quantity of public and private stores at Richmond, and vicinity, 
he went to Portsmouth [Jan. 20], opposite Norfolk, and made that his head- 
quarters. Great efforts were made by the Americans to seize and punish the 
traitor. The Virginia militia men were collected in great numbers, for the 
purpose ; and Jefferson, then governor of that State, offered a reward of five 
thousand guineas for his capture.^ La Fayette was sent into Virginia, with 
twelve hundred men, to oppose him ; and a portion of the French fleet went 
[March 8, 1781] from Rhode Island, to shut him up in the Elizabeth River, 
and assist in capturing him. But all these efforts failed. He was brave, vigil- 
ant, and exceedingly cautious. Admiral Arbuthnot^ pursued and attacked the 
French fleet on the 16th of March, and compelled it to return to Newport ; and 
General Phillips soon afterward joined Arnold [March 26], with more than 
two thousand men, and took the chief command. In April, the traitor accom- 
panied Phillips on another expedition up the James River, and after doing as 
much mischief as possible between Petersburg and Richmond, he returned to 
New York.^ We shall meet Arnold presently on the New England coast." 

During the year 1781, the southern States became the most important 
theater of military operations. General Greene^ was appointed, on the 30th of 
October, 1780, to succeed General Gates in the direction of the southern army. 
He first proceeded to Hillsborough, to confer with Governor Nash, and other 
civil ofiicers of North Carolina, and arrived at the head-quarters of the army, 
at Charlotte, on the second of December. On the following day he took formal 
command, and Gates immediately set out Tor the head-quarters of Washington, 
in East Jersey, to submit to an inquiry into his conduct at Camden,** which 
Congress had ordered. Greene, with his usual energy, at once prepared to 
confront or pursue the enemy, as occasion might require. He arranged his 
little army into two divisions. With the main body he took post at Cheraw, 
east of the Pedee, and General Morgan was sent Avitli the remainder (about 
a thousand strong) to occupy the country near the junction of the Pacolet and 
Broad Rivers. Cornwallis, who was just preparing to march into North Car- 

> Page 325. == Page 243. ^ Page 326. * Page 310. 

^ General Phillips sickened and died at Petersburg. Lord Cornwallis, who arrived from North 
Carolina soon afterward [page 338] took the chief command. In a skirmish, a short distance from 
Petersbm-g, on the 27th of April [1781], in which Arnold was engaged, he took some Americans 
prisoners. To one of them he put tlie question, "If the Americans should catch me, what would 
they do to me?" The soldier promptly replied, "They would bury with military honors the leg 
which was wounded at Saratoga^ and hang the remainder of you upon a gibbet." 

* Page 340. 

^ Nathanial Greene was bom, of Quaker parents, in Rhode Island, in 1740. He was an anchor- 
Rmith, and was pursuing his trade when the Revolution broke out. He hastened to Boston after 
the skirmish at Lexington, and from that time until the close of the war, he was one of the most 
Wfefnl officers in the army. He died near Savannah, in .lune, 1786, and was buried in a vault ia 
tiiat city. His sepulchre can not now be identified. No living person knows in what vault hia 
remains were deposited, and there is no record to cast light upon the question. * Page 315. 



IfSl.] SEVENTH YEA.R OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 331 



olina again/ when Greene made this disposition of his army, found himself in 
a dangerous position, for he was placed between the two divisions. Unwilling 
to leave Morgan in his rear, he sent Tarleton to capture or disperse his com- 




^'7:3 




mand. The Americans retreated before this superior force, but were overtaken 
at the Coivpe?is, in Spartanburg district, and compelled to fight.* There, well 
posted upon an eminence, Morgan' and his brave follow- 
ers turned upon their pursuers. Tarleton was discon- 
certed by this movement, for he expected to overtake the 
Americans while on the wing ; yet, feeling confident of 
an easy victory, he quickly arranged his line in battle 
order. It was now nine o'clock in the morning [January 

17, 1781]. At a signal from Tarleton, his advance gave ""« , i g^wi /l^/pP KA 
a shout, and rushed furiously to the contest, under cover 
of artillery, and an incessant discharge of musketry. 

' Page 318. 

" The scene of the battle is among the Thicketty Mountains, west of the Broad River. It was 
called Gowpens from the fact, that some time before the Revolution, some traders at Camden kept 
herds of cows in that fertile region. 

* Daniel Morgan, commander of the famous rifle corps of the Revolution, was bom in New Jer- 
sey, in 1738, and was in the humble sphere of a wagoner, when called to the field. He had been 
a soldier under Braddock, and joined Washington at Cambridge, in 1775. He served with distinc- 
tion in the army of the Revolution, and was a farmer in Yirginia after the war, where he died ia 
1802, 




GENERAL MORGAN. 



332 THE EEVOLUTION. [1781, 

The Americans were prepared to receive them, and combatted with them for 
more than two hours, with skill and bravery. The British were defeated, with 
a loss of almost three hundred men in killed and 
wounded, five hundred made prisoners, and a large quan- 
tity of arms, ammunition, and stores. It was a brilliant 
victory ; and Congress gave Morgan a gold medal, as a 
token of its approbation. Colonels Howard^ and Wash- 
ington,^ whose soldierly conduct won the battle, received 
't^l^// £^W^'' each a silver medal. 

When the battle was ended, Morgan pushed forward 

COLONEL WASHINGTON. • . I, 1, • • • x T j. xl n x l. J 

With nis prisoners, intending to cross the Catawba, and 
make his way toward Virginia. . Cornwallis started in pursuit of him, as soon 
as he heard of the defeat of Tarleton. He destroyed his heavy baggage, and 
hastened with his whole army toAvard the Catawba to intercept Morgan and 
his prisoners, before they should cross that stream. But he was too late. He 
did not reach that river until in the eveningr, two hours after Morgan had 




O' 



rgan 



crossed. Then feeling confident of his prey, he deferred his passage of the 
stream until morning. A heavy rain during the night filled the river to its 
brim ; and while the British were detained by the flood, Morgan had reached 
the banks of the Yadkin, where he was joined by General Greene and his escort. 
One of the most remarkable military movements on record, now occurred. 
It was the retreat of the American army, under Greene, from the Catawba, 
through North Carolina, into Virginia. When the waters of the Catawba had 
subsided, the next day, Cornwallis crossed, and resumed his pursuit. He 
reached the western bank of the Yadkin on the 3d of February [1781], just as 
the Americans were safely landed on the eastern shore. There he was again 
arrested in his progress by a sudden swelling of the floods. Onward the patriots 
pressed, and soon again Cornwallis was in full chase. At Guilford Court-house, 
the capital of Guilford county, Greene was joined [February 7], by his main 
body from Cheraw,^ and all continued the flight, for they were not strong 
enough to turn and fight. After many hardships and narrow escapes during 
the retreat, the Americans reached the Dan on the 13th of February, and 

^ Jolm Eager Howard, of the Maryland line. He was bom in Baltimore county in 1752. He 
■went into military service at the commencement of the war. He was in all the principal battles of 
the Revolution, was chosen governor of Maryland in 1778, was after wad United States Senator, and 
died m October, 1827. 

* WiUiam Wasliington, a relative of the general. He was born in Stafford county, Virginia. 
He entered the army under Mercer, who was killed at Princeton [page 269], and greatly distin- 
guished himself at the South, as a commander of a corps of cavalry. Taken prisoner at EutaW 
Springs [page 338], he remained a captive till the close of the war, and died in Charleston, in 
March, 1810. In a personal combat with Tarleton in the battle at the Cowpens, Washington 
wounded his antagonist in his hand. Some months afterward, Tarleton said, sneeringly, to Mrs. 
Willie Jones, a witty American lady, of Halifax, North Carolina, ■' Colonel Washmgton, I am told, 
is illiterate, and can not write his own name." "Ah! colonel,'' said Mrs. Jones, "you ought to 
know better, for you bear evidence that he can make his mark.''' At another time he expressed a 
desire to see Colonel Washington. Mrs. Ashe, Mrs. Jones's sister, instantly rephed, " Had you 
looked behind you at the Co^sNTjens you might have had that pleasure." Stung by this keen wit, 
Tarleton placed his hand upon his sword. General Leslie [page 347], who was present, remarked, 
"Say what you please, Mrs. Ashe; Colonel Tarleton knows better than to msult a lady in m/ 
presence," ' Page 330. 



1781.] SEVENTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 333 



crossed its rising waters safely into the friendly bosom of Halifax county, in 
Virginia. When Cornwallis arrived, a few hours later [February 14], the 
stream was too much swollen to allow him to cross. For the third time the 
waters, as if governed by a special Providence, interposed a barrier between 
the pursuers and the pursued. Mortified and dispirited, the earl here aban- 
doned the chase, and moving sullenly southward through North Carolina, he 
established his camp at Hillsborough. 

General Greene remained in Virginia only long enough to refresh his troops, 
and receive recruits,^ and then he re-crossed the Dan 
[February 23], to oppose Cornwallis in his efforts to 
embody the loyalists of North Carolina under the royal 
banner. Colonel Lee,' with his cavalry, scoured the 
country around the head waters of the Haw and Deep 
Rivers, and by force and stratagem foiled the efforts 
of Tarleton, who was recruiting in that region. On one 
occasion he defeated and dispersed [March 2] a body of H 
three hundred loyalists under Colonel Pyle,^ near the 
Alamance Creek, after which the Tories kept quiet, and 
very few dared to take up arms. Greene, in the mean 
while, had moved cautiously forward, and on the first 

of March [1781], he found himself at the head of almost five thousand troops. 
Feeling strong enough now to cope with Cornwallis, he sought an engagement 
with him, and on the 15th they met, and fiercely contended, near Guilford 
Court-house, about five miles from the present village of 
Greensborough, in Guilford county, North Carolina. 
That battle, which continued for almost two hours, was 
one of the severest of the war. Although the Americana 
were repulsed and the British became masters of the field^ 
the victory was almost as destructive for Cornwallis as a 
defeat. " Another such victory," said Charles Fox in the 
British. House of Commons, " will ruin the British army."* 
Both parties sufiered severely ; and, in some degree, the 
line of the Scotch ballad might be applied to them : 




COLONEL HENRY LEE. 




BATTLE OF GUILFORD. 



" They baith did fight, they baith did beat, they baith did rin awa.' 



' On his way south, to take command of the southern army, he left the Baron Steuben [page 
291] in Vu-ginia, to gather. recruits, provisions, &c., and forward them to him. This service the 
Baron performed with efficiency. 

'' Henry Lee was born in Virginia, in 1756. He entered the mihtary service as captain of a 
Virginia company in 1776, and in 1777 joined the continental army. At the head of a legion, he 
performed extraordinary services during the war, especially at the South. He was afterward- gov- 
ernor of Virginia, and a member of Congress. He died in 1818. 

* Lee sent two young countrymen, whom he had captured, to the camp of Pyle, to inform that 
leader that Tarleton was approaching, and wished to meet him. Pyle had never seen Tarleton, and 
when he came up he supposed Lee and his party to be that of the renowned British officer. 
Friendly salutations were expressed, and at a word, the Americans fell upon the loyalists, killed 
almost a hundred of them, and dispersed the remainder. This event took place two or three miles 
from the scene of the Regulator battle mentioned on page 223. 

* That statesman moved in committee, " That his majesty's ministers ought immediately to tako 
every possible means for concluding peace with our American colonies." Young William Pitt, tha 



834 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1181. 




hobkirk's hill. 



The battalions of Cornwallis were so shattered/ that he could not maintain 
the advantage he had gained ; while the Americans retreated in good order to 
the Reedy Fork. Thoroughly dispirited, he abandoned Western Carolina, and 
moved [March 19] with' his whole army, to Wilmington, near the sea-board. 
Greene rallied his forces and pursued the British as far as Deep River, in 
Chatham county. There he relinquished the pursuit, and prepared to re-entei^ 
South Carolina. 

Lord Rawdon,^ one of the most efficient of Cornwallis' s chief officers, was 
now in command of a British force at Camden. On the 6th of April, Greene 
marched directly for that place, and on the 19th, he 
encamped on Hobkirk's Hill, about a mile from ^awdon'a 
intrenchments. Six days afterward [April 25, 1781], he 
was surprised' and defeated by Rawdon, after a sharp battle 
for several hours, in which the Americans lost, in killed, 
wounded, and missing, two hundred and sixty-six men. 
The British lost two hundred and fifty-eight." The British 
retired to their works at Camden, and Greene, with his 
little army, encamped for the night on the north side of 
Sanders's Creek. ^ Greene conducted his retreat so well, 
that he carried away all his artillery and baggage, with 
fifty British prisoners, who were captured by Colonel Washington." 

This defeat was unexpected to Greene,' yet he was not the man to be 

successor of his father, the Eaii of Chatham, inveighed eloquently against a further prosecution of 
the war. He averred that it was " wicked, barbarous, unjust, and diaboUcal — conceived in injust- 
ice, nurtured in folly — a monstrous thing that contained every characteristic of moral depravity and 
human turpitude — as mischievous to the unhappy people of England as to the Americans." Yet, 
as in former years, the British government was blind and stubborn still 

^ The Americans lost in kUled and wounded, aljout four hundred men, besides almost a thousand 
who deserted to their homes. The loss of the British was over six liundred. Among the oflQcers 
who were killed was Lieutenant-Colonel Webster, who was one of the most efficient men in the 
British army. On this occasion, Greene's force was much superior in number to that of Comwallia, 
and he had every advantage of position. Events such as are generaUy overlooked by the historian, 
but which exhibit a prominent trait in the character of the people of North Carolina, occurred during 
this battle, and deserve great prominence in a description of the gloomy picture, for they form 
a few touches of radiant light in the midst of the sombre coloring. While the roar of cannon 
boomed over the country, groups of women, in the Buffalo and Alamance congregations, who were 
under the pastoral charge of the Reverend Dr. Caldwell, might have been seen engaged in common 
prayer to the God of Hosts for his protection and aid ; and in many places, the solitary voice of a 
pious woman went up to the Divine Ear, with the earnest pleadings of faith, for the success of the 
Americans. The battling hosts were surrounded by a cordon o{ praying women during those dread- 
ful hours of contest. '^ Page 315. 

' Greene was breakfasting at a spring on the eastern slope of Hobkirk's Hill, when Rawdon'a 
army, by a circuitous rout through a forest, fell upon him. Some of his men were cleaning their 
guns, others were washing their clothes, and all were unsuspicious of danger. 

* The number killed was remarkably small Only eighteen of the Americans, and thirty-eight 
of the British, were slain on the battle-field. * Page 315. 

® He had captured two hundred, but hastily paroling the officers and some of the men, he took 
only fifty with him. 

' Greene had some desponding views of the future at this time. To Luzerne, the French min- 
ister at Philadelphia, he earnestly wrote : "This distressed country cannot struggle much longer 
without more effectual support. * * * We fight, get beaten, rise, and fight again. The whole 
country is one continued scene of blood and slaughter." To La Fayette, he wrote : " You maj 
depend upon it, that nothing can equal the sufferings of our little army, but their merit." To Gov- 
ernor Reed, of Pennsylvania, he wrote: "If our good friends, the French, cannot lend a helping 
hand to save these sinking States, they must and will fall." At that time, the French army had 
remained for several months inactive, in New England. 



1781.] SEVENTH TEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 385 



crushed by adversity. On the morning succeeding the battle, he retired a;S far 
as Rugeley's Mills, and then srossing the AVateree, he took a strong position 
tor offensive and defensive operations. The two armies were now about equal 
iii numbers, and Greene's began to increase. Alarmed by this, and for the 




safety of his posts in the lower country, Rawdon set fire to Camden and 
retreated [May 10, 1781] to Nelson's Ferry, on the Santee. He had ordered 
Lieutenant-Colonel Cruger' to abandon Ninety-six" and join Brown at Augusta,^ 
and had also directed Maxwell, the commander of Fort Granby,^ to leave that 
post, and retire to Orangeburg,^ on the North Edisto. But his orders and his 
movements were made too late. Within the space of a -week, four important 
posts fell into the hands of the Americans," and Greene was making rapid marches 
toward Ninety-six. Lee had pressed forward and co-operated with Piekens in 

' Page 313. 

' So called because it was ninety-six miles from the frontier fort, Prince George, on the Keowee 
River. Its site is occupied by the pleasant village of Cambridge, in Abbeville District, one hundred 
and forty-seven miles north-west from Charleston. ' Page 313. 

* On the western side of the Congaree, two miles from the present city of Columbia, South 
Carolina. 

' On the east bank of the North Edisto, about sixty-five miles south of Columbia. 

• Lee and Marion were the principal leaders against these posts. Orangeburg was taken on the 
nth of May; Fort Motte on the 12th; the post at Nelson's Ferry on the 14th, and Fort Granby on 
tlie 16th. Fort Watson, situated on the Santee, a few miles above Nelson's Ferry, was taken on 
the 16th of April. Nelson's Ferry is at the mouth of Eutaw Creek, on the Santee, about fifty miles 
from Charleston. Fort Motte was near the junction of the Wateree and Congaree Rivers, and was, 
because ot its Teoarraphical position, the most important of all th.ese posts. It was composed of the 
fine residence of Rebecca Motte (a widowed mother, with six cliildren), and temporary fortifications 
constructed around it. Mrs. Motte, who was an ardont Whis, had been driven to her farm-house 
upon an eminence near by. Marion and T^F-e appenrf^d before Fort Motte witli a considerable force;, 
but having only one piece of artUlery, could make but slight impression. The expected approach 



336 



THE REVOLUTION" 



[1781. 



holding the country-between Ninetj-six and Augusta, to prevent a junction of 
the garrisons at either of those places ; and thus, by skillful operations, the 
Americans completely paralyzed the lately potent strength of the enemy. At 
the beginning of June [1781], the British possessed only three posts in South 
Carolina, namely, Charleston, Nelson's Ferry, and Ninety-six. 

On the 22d of May [1781], Greene commenced the siege of Ninety-six,* 
with less than a thousand regulars and a few raw militia. Kosciuszko," the 
brave Pole, was his chief engineer, and the post being too strong to be captured 
by assault, the Americans commenced making regular ap- 
proaches, by parallels.' Day after day the work went 
slowly on, varied by an occasional sortie. For almost a 
month, the efforts of the Americans were unavailing. Then 
hearing of the approach of Rawdon, with a strong force, to 
the relief of Cruger, they made an unsuccessful effort, on 
the 18th of June, to take the place by storm. They raised 
the siege the following evening [June 19], and retreated 
Rawdon pursued them a short distance, when he wheeled 




FORT NINETY-SIS. 



beyond the Saluda. 

and marched to Orangeburg. 

Although unsuccessful at Ninety-six, detachments of the Republican army 
were victorious elsewhere. While this siege was pro- 
gressing, Lee and Pickens, with Clarke and others of 
Georgia, were making successful efforts on the Savan- 
nah River. Lee captured Fort Galphin, twelve miles 
below Augusta, on the 21st of INIay, and then he sent 
an officer to that post, to demand of Brown an instant 
surrender of his garrison. Brown refused, and the 
siege of Augusta was commenced on the 23d. It 
continued until the 4th of June, when a general as- 




GENERAL PICKEX 



of Rawdon, would not allow them to make the slow process of a regular siege. Lee proposed to 
hurl some burning missile upon the building, and consume it. To this destruction of her property, 
:Mrs. Motte at once consented, and bringing out a bow and some arrows, which had been brought 
from the East Indies, these were used successfully for the purpose of convejing fire to the dr}^ roo£ 
The house was partially destroyed, when the Britisli surrendered. The patriotic lady then regaled 
both the American and British officers with a good dinner at her own table. Colonel Horry (one 
of Marion's ofScers), in his narrative, mentions some pleasing incidents which occurred at the table 
of Mrs. Motte, on this occasion. Among the prisoners was Captain Ferguson, an officer of consider- 
able reputation. Finding himself near Horry, Ferguson said, " You are Colonel Horry, I presume, 
sir." Horry replied in the affirmative, when Ferguson continued, "Well, I was with Colonel "Wat- 
son when he fought your General Marion on Sampit. I think I saw you there with a party of 
horse, and also at Nelson's Ferry, when Marion surprised our party at the house. But," he con- 
tinued, " I was hid in high grass, and escaped. You were fortunate in ysur escape at Sampit, for 
Watson and Small had twelve hundred men." "If so," replid Horry, "I certainly was fortunate, 
for I did not suppose they had more than half that number." "I consider myself," added the cap. 
tain, "equally fortunate in escaping at Nelson's Old Field." "Truly you were," answered Horry 
dryly, "for Marion had but tliirty militia on that occasion." The officers present could not suppress: 
laughter. When Greene inquired of Horry how he came to affront Captain Ferguson, he rephed, 
" He affronted himself by telling his own story." 

' The principal work was a star redoubt [note 3, page 192]. There was a picketed inclosure 
[note 1, page 127] around the little village; and on the west side of a stream running from a 
spring (a) was a stockade [note 2, page 183] fort. The besiegers encamped at four different points 
around the works. ' ° Page 277. 

* These are trenches, dug in a zig-zag Ime in the direction of the forti-ess to be assailed. Th* 



1781.] SEVENTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 337 

sault was agreed upon. Brown now proposed a surrender ; and the following 
day [June 5, 1781] the Americans took possession of that important post. 
They lost fifty-one men, killed and wounded ; the British lost fifty-two killed, 
and three hundred and thirty-four (including the wounded) were made pris- 
oners. At the close of the siege, Lee and Pickens' hastened to join Greene 
before Ninety-six, and all, on the approaoh of Rawdon, retreated beyond the 
Saluda, as we have observed. 

The two chief commanders of the belligerent forces now changed relative 
positions. When Rawdon retired toward Orangeburg, Greene became his pur- 
suer, and sent a message to Marion and Sumter, then on the Santee, to take a 
position in front of the enemy, so as to retard his progress." Finding Rawdon 
strongly intrenched at Orangeburg, Greene deemed it prudent not to attack 
him. The Americans crossed the Congaree, and the main body encamped on 
the High Hills of Santee^ in Santee district, there to pass the hot and sickly 
season. Leaving his troops at Orangeburg, in the command of Colonel Stew- 
art (who had come up from Charleston with a reinforcement), Rawdon went to 
the sea-board and embarked for England.' 

Early in August, Greene was reuiforced by North Carolina troops, under 
General Sumner ; and at the close of that month he crossed the Wateree and 
Congaree, and marched upon Orangeburg. Stewart (who had been joined by 



earth i3 cast up in such a way that the workmen are shielded from shots from the assailed works, 
and in this way they get near enough to undermine a fort, or erect a battery, so as to have a power- 
ful effect. 

* Andrew Pickens was bom in Pennsylvania, in 1739. In childhood he went to South Car- 
olina, and was one of the first in the field for liberty, in the upper country of that State. He was a 
very useful officer, and good citizen. He died in 1817, at the age of seventy-eight years. 

* It is related that the message to Sumter from Greene was conveyed by Emily Geiger, the 
daughter of a German planter in Fairfield district. He prepared a letter to that officer, but none 
of his men appeared willing to attempt the hazardous service, for the Tories were on the alert, a« 
Rawdon was approaching the Congaree. Greene was delighted by the boldness of a young girl, 
not more than eighteen years of age, who came forward and volunteered to carry the letter to Sum- 
ter. With liis usual caution, he communicated the contents of the letter to Emily, fearing she 
might lose it on the way. The maiden mounted a fleet horse, and crossing the Wateree at the 
Camden Ferry, pressed on toward Sumter's camp. Passing through a dry swamp on the second 
day of her journey, she was intercepted by some Tory scouts. Coming from the direction of Greene's 
army, she was an object of su.spicion, and was taken to a house on the edge cf the swamp, and con- 
fined in a room. With proper delicacy, they sent for a woman to search her person. No sooner 
was she left alone, than she ate up Greene's letter piece by piece. After a while, the matron ar- 
rived, made a careful search, but discovered nothing. With many apologies, Emily was allowed to 
pursue her journey. She reached Sumter's camp, communicated Greene's message, and soon Raw- 
don was flying before the Americans toward Orangeburg. Emily Geiger afterward married Mr. 
Thurwits, a rich planter on the Congaree. 

^ A short time before he sailed, Rawdon was a party to a cruel transaction which created a 
great deal of excitement throughout the South. Among those who took British protection after the 
fall of Charleston in 1780 [page 311], was Colonel Isaac Hayne, a highly respectable Carolinian. 
When General Greene, the following year, confined the British to Charleston alone, and their pro- 
tection had no force, Hayne considered himself released fi-om the obligations of his parole, took up 
arms for his country, and was made a prisoner. Colonel Balfour was then in chief command at 
Charleston, and from the beginning seemed determined on the death of Hayne. Without even the 
form of a trial, that patriot was condemned to be hanged. Not one, not even the prisoner, supposed 
that such a cruelty was contemplated, until the sentence was made pubUc, and he was informed 
that he had but two days to live. The men of the city pleaded for him ; the women signed peti» 
tions, and went in troops, and upon their knees, implored a remission of his sentence. All was 
in vain. Rawdon had exerted his influence to save the prisoner, but finally he consented to hi^ 
execution, as a traitor, and he became as inexorable as Balfour. Greene was inchned to retaliate, 
but, fortunately, hostilities soon afterward ceased, and the flow of blood was stopped. 



338 THE EEVOLUTIOX. [ITSL 

Cruger from Ninety-six), immediatelj retreated to Eutaw Springs, near the 
south-west bank of the Santee, and there encamped. Greene pursued ; and on 
the morning of the 8th of September [1781], a severe battle commenced. The 
British -were driven from their camp ; and Greene's troops, like those of Sum- 
iter at Hanging Rock,' scattered among the tents of the enemy, drinking and 
plundering. The British unexpectedly renewed the battle, and after a bloody 
conflict of about four hours, the Americans were obliged to give way. Stewart 
felt insecure, for the partisan legions were not far off, and that night the Brit- 
ish retreated toward Charleston. The next day [Sept. 9, 1781], Greene ad- 
vanced and took possession of the battle-field, and then sent detachments in 
pursuit of the enemy. Both parties claimed the honor of a victory. It be- 
longed to neither, but the advantage was with the Americans. Congress and 
the whole country gave warm expressions of their appreciation of the valor of 
the patriots. The skill, bravery, caution, and acuteness of Greene, were highly 
applauded ; and Congress ordered a gold medal, ornamented with emblems of 
the battle, to be struck in honor of the event, and presented to him, together 
with a British standard, captured on that occasion. The Americans lost, in 
killed, wounded, and missing, five hundred and fifty-five. The British lost six 
hundred and ninety-three. 

While these events were transpiring upon the upper waters of the Santee,' 
Marion, Sumter, Lee, and other partisans, were driving British detachments 
from post to post, in the lower country, and smiting parties of loyalists in every 
direction. The British finally evacuated all their interior stations, and retired 
to Charleston, pursued almost to the verge of the city by the bold American 
scouts and partisan troops. At the close of the year [1781] the British at the 
South were confined to Charleston and Savannah ; and besides these places, 
they did not hold a single post south of New York. Late in the season 
[November] Greene moved his army to the vicinity of Charleston,' placing it 
between that city and the South Carolina Legislature, then in session at Jack- 
sonborough ; while Wayne, at the opening of 1782, was closely watching the 
British at Savannah. 

We left Cornwallis, after the battle at Guilford Court-house, making his 
way toward Wilmington,* then in possession of a small British garrison, under 
Major Craig. Cornwallis arrived there on the seventh of April, 1781, and 
remained long enough to recruit and rest his shattered army. Apprised of 
Greene's march toward Camden, and hoping to draw him away from Lord 
Rawdon, then encamped there," he marched into Virginia, joined the forces of 
Phillips and Arnold, at Petersburgh,' and then attempted the subjugation of 
that State. He left Wilmington on the 25th of April, crossed the Roanoke at 

' Page 315. 

' At Columbia, the Saluda and "Wateree join, and form the Congaree. This, with other and 
«naller tributaries, form the Santee. The Wateree, above Camden, is called the Catawba. 

^ After the battle at Eutaw Springs, Greene again encamped on the High Hills of Santee, from 
whence he sent out expeditions toward Charleston. These were successfiil, and the enemy -vraa 
kept close upon the sea-board during the remainder of the war. * Page 334. 

» Page 315. * Page 330. 



1781.] SEVENTH YEAR OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 33^ 

Halifax, and on the 20th of May, reached Petersburg. La Fayette was then 
in Virginia, ' but his force was too small eflfectually to oppose the invaders, and 
the State seemed doomed to British rule. 

For the purpose of bringing La Fayette into action, Cornwallis penetrated 
the country beyond Richmond, and destroyed an immense amount of property?- ' 
He also sent out marauding parties in various directions,' and for several weets 
the whole State was kept in great alarm. He finally proceeded [June, 1781] 
slowly toward the coast, closely pursued by La Fayette, Wayne, and Steuben. 
While lying at Williamsburg, he received [June 29] orders from General 
Clinton, to take post near the sea, in order to reinforce the garrison at New 
York, if necessary, which was now menaced by the combined American and 
French armies. He crossed the James River [July 9] at Old Jamestown, 
where he was attacked by Wayne before he could embark his troops. Wayne 
struck a severe blow, and then skillfully and hastily retreated back to 
the main army under La Fayette, then only two miles distant. His loss was 
inconsiderable, but the attack damaged the British seriously. After crossing 
the river, Cornwallis proceeded by land to Portsmouth, opposite Norfolk ; but 
disliking that situation, he went to Yorktown, on the York River, and com- 
menced fortifying that place and Gloucester Point, opposite. 

The French army under Rochambeau,* in the mean while, had left New 
England, and made its way to the Hudson River, where 
it joined [July 6, 1781] that of the Americans, in the 
vicinity of Dobbs' Ferry. ^ At that time, Washington, 
who had the immediate command of the American 
forces, contemplated an attack upon the British in New 
York city. For six weeks the two armies remained in 
Westchester waiting for the arrival of the Count De 
Grasse, an eminent French naval commander, to co- 
operate in the attack. While preparing to strike the 

blow, Clinton was reinforced [August 11] by nearly three count de rochambeau. 
thousand troops from Europe; and intelligence came 
from De Grasse that he could not then leave the West Indies. Thus foiled, 
Washington turned his thoughts to Virginia ; and when, a few days afterward, 
he learned from Be Barras, the successor of Ternay,' in command of the French 

' Page 330. 

* The principal object of Cornwallis in marching beyond Richmond, was to prevent a junction 
•with La Fayette of troops under "Wayne, then approaching through Maryland. Uut the marquis 
was too expert, outmarched the earl, and met Wayne on the 10th of June. 

' Colonel Simcoe, commander of an active corps called the Queen's Rangers, was sent to capture 
or destroy stores at the junction of the Fluvanna and Rivanna Rivers. Cornwallis also dispatched 
Tarleton to attempt the capture of Governor Jefferson and the Legislature, who had fled from Rich- 
mond to Charlottesville, near the residence of Mr. Jefferson. Seven members of the Legislature fell 
into his hands [June 4], and Mr. Jefferson narrowly escaped capture by fleeing from his house to 
the mountains. 

* The Count Rochambeau was born at Vendome, in France, in 1725. He was a distinguished 
ofiBcer in the French army, and after his return from America, was made a Field Marshal by hia 
king. He was pensioned hj Bonaparte, and died in 1807. ^ Page 257. 

' Admiral Ternay died at Newport, soon after the arrival of the fleet there, in the summer of 
1780. His remains were deposited in Trinity Charch-yard there, and a marble slab was placed 
over his grave. 





340 THE REVOLUTION. [1781. 

fleet at Newport, that De Grasse was about to sail for the 
Chesapeake, he resolved to march southward, and assist 
La Fayette against Cornwallis. He wrote deceptive let- 
ters to General Greene in New Jersey, and sent them so 
as to be intercepted by Sir Henry Clinton.' He thus 
blinded the British commander to his real intentions ; and 
it was not until the allied armies had crossed the Hudson, 
passed through New Jersey, and were marching from the 
Delaware toAvard the head of Chesapeake Bay,^ that Clin- 
couxT DE GRASSE. tou was convluccd that an attack upon the city of New 
York was not the object of Washington's movements. It 
was then too late for successful pursuit, and he endeavored to recall the Amer- 
icans by sending Arnold to desolate the New England coast. Although there 
was a terrible massacre perpetrated by the invaders at Fort Griswold' [Septem- 
ber 6, 1781], and New London, opposite (almost in sight of the traitor's birth- 
place),* was burned, it did not check the progress of Washington toward that 
goal where he was to win the greatest prize of his niilitary career. Nor did 
reinforcements sent by water to aid Cornwallis, effect their object, for when 
Admiral Graves arrived off the Capes [September 5], De Grasse was there to 
guard the entrance to the Chesapeake.^ He went out to fight Graves, but after 
a partial action, both withdrew, and the French fleet was anchored [September 
10] within the Capes.^ ■ 

While Cornwallis was fortifying Yorktown and Gloucester, and the hostile 
fleets were in the neighboring waters, the allied armies, twelve thousand strong.^ 
were making their way southward. They arrived before Yorktown on the 28th 
of September, 1781 ; and after compelling the British to abandon their out- 
works, commenced a regular siege. The place was completely invested on the 
30th, the line of the allied armies extending in a semi-circle, at a distance of 
almost two miles from the British works, each wing resting upon the York 
River. Having completed some batteries, the Republicans opened a heavy can- 
nonade upon the town and the British works on the evening of the 9th of Oc- 

* These letters directed Greene to prepare for an attack on New York. 

" This is generally called in the letters and histories of tlie time, "Head of Elk," the narrow, 
upper part of the Chesapeake being called Elk River. There stands the village of Elkton. 

* Arnold landed at the mouth of the Thames, and proceeded to attack Fort Trumbull, near New 
London. The garrison evacuated it, and the village was burned. Another division of the expe- 
dition went up on the east side of the Thames, attacked Fort Griswold at Groton, and after Colonel 
Ledyard had surrendered it, he and almost every man in the fort were cruelly murdered, or badly 
wounded. There is a monument to their memory at Groton. 

* He was bom at Norwich, at the head of the Thames, a few mOes north of New London. See 
note 1, page 327. 

* Graves intended to intercept a French squadron, which was on its way with heavy cannons 
and military stores for the armies at Yorktown. He was not aware that De Grasse had left the 
"West Indies. 

' The place of anchorage was in Lynn Haven Bay. The hostile fleets were in sight of each 
other for five successive days, but neither party was anxious to renew the combat. 

' Including the Virginia militia, the whole of the American and French forces employed in the 
Biege, amounted to a httle over sixteen thousand men. Of the Americans, about seven thousand 
were regular troops, and four thousand militia. The French troops numbered about five thousand, 
including those brought by De Grasse from the West Indies. 



1781.] SEVENTH YEAR OP THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 34X 



tober. On the following evening thej hurled red-hot balls among the British 
shipping in front of the town, and burned several vessels. Hour after hour, 
disasters were gathering a fearful web of difficulty around Cornwallis. De- 
spairing of aid from Clinton, and perceiving his strong fortifications crumbling, 
one by one, under the terrible storm of iron from a hundred heavy cannons, he 
attempted to escape on the night of the 16th, by crossing to Gloucester, break- 
ing through the French troops stationed there, and making forced marches to- 
ward New York. When the van of his troops embarked, the waters of the 
York River were perfectly calm, although dark clouds were gathering in the 
horizon. Then a storm arose as sudden 
and as fearful as a summer tornado, dis- 
persed the boats, compelled many to put 
back, and the attempt was abandoned.' 
Hope now faded ; and on the 19th, Corn- 
wallis surrendered the posts at York- 
town and Gloucester, with almost seven 
thoujand British soldiers, and his ship- 
ping and seamen, into the hands of Wash- 
ington and De Grasse," 

The ceremony, on the occasion of 
the suriender, was exceedingly impos- 
ing. The American army was drawn 
up on the right side of the road lead- 
ing from Yorktown to Hampton (see 
map), and the French army on the left. Their lines extended more than a 
mile in length. Washington, upon hh wliite charger, was at the head of the 
American column ; and Rochambeau, upon a powerful bay horse, was at the 
.head of the French column. A vast concourse of people, equal in number, ac- 
cording to eye-witnessfes, to the military^ was also assembled from the sur- 
rounding country to participate in the joy of the event. Universal silence pre- 
vailed as the vanquished troops slowly marched out of their intrenchments, with 
their colors cased, and their drums beating a British tune, and passed between 
the columns of the combined armies. All were eager to look upon Lord Corn- 
wallis, the terror of the South,' in the hour of his adversity. They were dis- 




OF YORKTOWN. 



' Note 4, page 247. 

* The British lost one hundred and fifty-six killed, three hundred and twenty-six wounded, and 
seventy missing. The combined armies lost, in killed and wounded, about three hundred. Among 
the spoils were seventy -five brass, and one hundred and sixty iron cannons ; seven thousand seven 
hundred and ninety-four muskets ; twenty-eight regimental standards ; a large quantity of musket 
and cannon-balls ; and nearly eleven thousand dollars in specie in the military chest. The army 
was surrendered to Washington, and the shipping and seamen to De Grasse. The latter soon after- 
ward left the Chesapeake, and went to the West Indies. Rochambeau remained with his troops in 
Virginia during the winter, and the main body of the American army marched north, and went into 
winter quarters on the Hudson. A strong detachment, under General St. Clair [page 276], was 
tent south to drive the British from Wilmington, and reinforce the army of General Greene, then 
lying near Charleston. 

' The conduct of Lord Cornwallis, during his march of over fifteen hundred miles through the 
Southern States, was often disgraceful to the British name. He suffered dwelling-houses to be 
•plundered of every thmg that could be carried off; and it was well known that his lordship's tabla 



342 THE REVOLUTION. [1781. 

appointed ; he had given himself up to vexation and despair, and, feigning 
illness, he sent General O'Hara with his sword, to lead the vanquished armj to 
the field of humiliation. Having arrived at the head of the line, General 
O'Hara advanced toward Washington, and, taking off his hat, apologized for the 
absence of Earl Cornwallis. The commander-in-chief pointed him to General 
Lincoln for directions. It must have been a proud moment for Lincoln, for 
only the year before he was obliged to make a humiliating surrender of his 
army to British conquerors at Charleston.' Lincoln conducted the royal troops 
to the field selected for laying down their arms, and there General O'Hara 
delivered to him the sword of Cornwallis. Lincoln received it. and then po- 
litely handed it back to O'Hara, to be returned to the earl. 

The delivery of the colors of the several regiments, twenty-eight in num- 
ber, was next performed. For this purpose, twenty-eight British captains, 
each bearing a flag in a case, were drawn up in line. Opposite to them, at a 
distance of six paces, twenty-eight American sergeants were placed in line to 
receive the colors. An ensign Avas appointed by Colonel Hamilton, the officer 
of the dav, to conduct this interesting ceremony.'^ When the ensign gave the 
order for the British captains to advance two paces, to deliver up their colors, 
and the American sergeants to advance two paces to receive them, the former 
hesitated, and gave as a reason, that they were unwilling to surrender their 
flags to non-commissioned officers. Hamilton, who was at a distance, observed 
this hesitation, and rode up to inquire the cause. On being informed, he will- 
incrly spared the feelings of the British captains, and ordered the ensign to 
receive them himself, and hand them to the American sergeants. The scene is 
depicted in the engraving. 

Clinton appeared at the entrance to Chesapeake Bay a few days afterward, 
with seven thousand troops, but it was too late. The final blow which struck 
down British power in America had been given. The victory was complete ; 
and Clinton returned to New York, amazed and disheartened. 

Great was the joy throughout the colonies when intelhgence of the capture 
of the British army reached the people. From every family altar where a love 
of freedom dwelt — from pulpits, legislative halls, the army, and fi'om Congress,* 



was furnished with plate thus obtained from private fixmilies. His march was more frequently that 
of a marauder than an honorable general. It is estimated that Virginia alone lost, during Corn- 
wallis's attempt to reduce it, thirty thousand slaves. It was also estimated, at the time, from the best 
information that could be obtained, that, during the six months previous to the surrender at York- 
tov/n, the whole devastations of his army amounted in value to about fifteen miUions of dollars. 

' Page 311. 

^ I^nsign Robert Wilson, of General James Clinton's New York Brigade. He was the youngest 
commissioned officer in the army, being then only eighteen years of age. He was afterward a magis- 
trate in central New York for a number of years, and was for some time postmaster at Manlius, in 
Onondago county. He died in 1811. 

* A messenger, with a dispatch from Washington, reached Philadelphia at midnight. Soon the 
watchmen in the streets cried, •' Past twelve o'clock, and Cornwallis is taken." Before dawn the 
exulting people filled the streets; and at an early hour, Secretary Thomson [page 227] read that 
cheering letter to the assembled Congress. Then that august body went in procession to a temple 
of the living God [Oct. 24th, 1781], and there joined in public thanksgivings to the King of kings, 
for the great victory. They also resolved that a marble column should be erected at Yorktown, to 
commemorate the event; and that two stands of colors should be presented to Washington, and two- 
pieces of cannon to each of the French commanders, Rochambeau and De Grasse. 




Surrender of Flags at Yorktown. 



1782.] CLOSING EVENTS OF THE WAR FOR I NDEPENDENCE. 345 

there went up a shout of thanksgiving and praise to the Lord God Omnipotent, 
for the success of the allied troops, and these were mingled with universal eulo- 
gies of the great leader and his companions in arms. The clouds which had 
lowered for seven long years, appeared to be breaking, and the splendors of 
the dawn of peace burst forth, like the light of a clear morning after a dismal 
night of tempest and woe. And the desire for peace, which had long burned 
in the bosom of the British people, now found such potential expression, as to 
be heeded bj the British ministry. The intelligence of the fate of Cornwallis 
and his party, fell Avith all the destructive energy of a bomb-shell in the midst 
of the war-party in Parliament;' and the stoutest declaimers in fiivor of bay- 
onets and gunpowder, Indians and German mercenaries," as fit instruments for 
enslaving a free people, began to tal!c of the expediency of peace. Public 
opinion soon found expression in both Houses of Parliament ; and Lord North^ 
and his compeers, who had misled the nation for twelve years, gave way 
under the pressure of the peace sentiment, and retired from office on the 20th 
of March, 1782. The advocates of peace then came into power ; and early in 
the following May, Sir Guy Carleton^ arrived in New York, with propositions 
for a reconciliation. 



CHAPTER IX. 

CLOSING EVENTS OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. [1782—1789.] 

General Greene, with the main body of the Southern army, was yet on 
the High Hills of Santee, Avhen, on the 30th of October [1781], intelligence 
of the capture of Cornwallis reached him. The day of its arrival was made 
jubilant with rejoicings by the army. The event seemed to be a guaranty for 
the future security of the Republicans in the South, and Governor Rutledge^ 
soon called a Legislative Assembly, to meet at Jacksonborough, to re-establish 
civil authority. An offer of pardon for penitents, brought hundreds of Tories 
from the British lines at Charleston, to accept the clemency. The North Caro- 
lina Tories were dismayed, for immediately after the surrender of Cornwallis, 
St. Clair" had marched upon Wilmington, when the frightened enemy imme- 
diately abandoned that post, and ISIajor Craig, the commander, and a few 
followers, took post upon St. John's Island, near Charleston. Yet the vigilance 
of the Americans was not. allowed to slumber, for a wary foe yet occupied the 
capitals of South Carohnaand Georgia. Marion and his men kept '■' zit^h. and 
ward" over the region between the Cooper and the Santee,' while Greene's main 



' Lord George Germaine said that Lord North received the intelligence "as he would have 
done a cannon-ball in his breast." He paced the room, and throwing his arms wildly about, kept 
exclaiming, " 0, God 1 it is all over, it is all over !" 

" Page 246. ^ Page 224. " Page 240. " Page 310. « Page 276. 

^ On one occasion, Marion's brigade suflered a severe defeat, wliile the commander was attend- 



346 



THE REVOLUTION 



[1782. 



army lay near the Edisto ; and Wayne, always vigilant, kept the enemy as 
close within his intrenchments at Savannah. Washington, who returned to the 
North immediately after the surrender, was, at the same time, keeping Clinton 
ftud his army close prisoners in New York. 




While the theater of war was thus narrowing, British statesmen of all 
parties, considering the capture of Cornwallis and his army as the death-blow 
to all hope for future conquests, turned their attention to measures for an 
honorable termination of the unnatural war. General Conway, the firm and 
long-tried friend of the Americans, oflfered a resolution in Parliament in Febru- 
ary [1782], which was preliminary to the enactment of a decree for command- 
ing the cessation of hostilities. It was lost by only one vote. Thus encouraged, 



hig his duties aa a member of the South Carolina Legislature. He left liis men in command of 
Colonel Horry, and near the Santee, Colonel Thompson (afterward the eminent Count Rumford) 
attacked the corps, with a superior force, and dispersed it. Marion arrived during the engagement, 
rallied his brigade, and then retired beyond the Santee, to reorganize and recruit. Benjamin 
Thompson wis a native of Massachusetts, and was born in March, 1753. He became a school- 
master, and while acting in that capacity, he married a rich widow. Already his mind was filled 
■with, scientific knowledge, and now he pursued his studies and investigations with energy. When 
the Revolution broke out, he refused to take part in political matters. The Whigs drove him to 
Boston for British protection, and he was sent to England by Lord Howe, with dispatches. Toward 
the close of the war, he commanded a corps of Tories at New York and Charleston. He returned 
to Europe, became acquainted with the sovereign of Bavaria, made himself exceedingly useful, was 
raised to the highest dignity, and was created a count. After suffering many vicissitudes, he died, near 
Paris, in August. 1814. His daughter, the Countess of Rumford, who was born in America, died at 
Concord, New Hampshire, in 1852. See Lossing's Eminmt Americans. 



1T89.] CLOSING EVENTS OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 34^ 

the opposition pressed the subject warmly upon the attention of the House of 
Commons and the nation, and on the 4th of March, Conwaj moved "That th^ 
House would consider as enemies to his majesty and the country all those wh(i 
should advise, or by any means attempt, the further prosecution of offensive 




yzy 



war on the Continent of North America." The resolution was carried without 
a division, and the next day the attorney-general introduced a plan for a truce 
with the Americans. Orders for a cessation of hostilities speedily went forth 
to the British commanders in America, and preparations were soon made for 
evacuating the cities of Savannah and Charleston. 

When General Leslie, the British commander at Charleston, was apprised 
of these proceedings in Parliament, he proposed to General Greene a cessation 
of hostilities. Like a true soldier, Greene referred the matter to Congress, and 
did not for a moment relax his vigilance. Leslie also requested Greene to allow 
him to purchase supplies for his army, at the same time declaring his intention 
to evacuate Charleston. Greene was unwilling thus to nourish a viper, until 
his power to injure was destroyed, and he refused. Leslie then resorted to 
force to obtain provisions. Already he had made several efforts to penetrate 
the country for the purpose, and now, late in August, he attempted to ascend 
the Combahee,* when he was opposed by the Americans under General Gist, of 



Page 42. 



548 THE REVOLUTION. [1782. 

the Maryland line. Colonel John Laurens' volunteered in the service ; and in 
a skirmish at day-break, on the 25th of August, he was killed. He was greatly 
beloved by all, and his death was mourned with real sorrow. His was almost 
the last hfe sjicrificed in that glorious old war. The blood of one other was 
shed at Stono Ferry/ a few weeks afterward, when Captain Wilmot was killed in 
a skirmish with a British foraging party. 

Several weeks previous to this, the British had evacuated Savannah. That 
event occurred on the llth of July, when General Wayne, in consideration of 
the eminent services of Colonel James Jackson,' appointed him to " receive the 
keys of the city of Savannah"' from a committee of British officers. He per- 
formed the duty with great dignity, and on the same day the American army 
entered the city. Royal power then ceased in Georgia, forever. On the 14th 
of December following, the British evacuated Charleston, and the next day, the 
Americans, under General Greene, took possession of it, greeted from windows, 
balconies, and even house-tops, with cheers, waving of handkercniefs, and cries 
of "God bless you, gentlemen! Welcome! Welcome!" The British 
remained in New York almost a year longer (until the 25th of November, 
1783), under the command of Sir Guy Carleton, who had succeeded Sir Henry 
Clinton, because the final negotiations for peace were not completed, by ratifi- 
cation, until near that time. 

Measures were now taken by Congress and the British government to 
arrange a treaty of peace. The United States appointed five commissioners for 
the purpose, in order that difierent sections of the Union might be represented. 
These consisted of John Adams, John Jay, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jef- 
ferson, and Henry Laurens. These met Ricliard Oswald, the English com- 
missioner, at Paris, and there, on the 30th of November, 1782, they signed a 
preliminary treaty.' French and English commissioners also signed a treaty 
of peace on the 20th of January following. Congress ratified the action of its 
commissioners in April, 1783, yet negotiations were in progress until September 
following, when a definitive treaty was signed [September 3, 1783] at Paris." 
Li that treaty, England acknowledged the Independence of the United 
States ; allowed ample boundaries, extending northward to the Great Lakes, 

' Note 2, page 329. ' Page 2.^6. 

* James Jackson was one of the most eminent men in Georgia. He was bom in England, in 
September, 1757, and came to America in 1772. He studied law at Savannah, and was an active 
soldier during the whole war for Independence. "When a httle past thirty years of age, he was 
elected governor of Georgia, but dechned the honor on account of his youth. He was a member 
of the United States Senate for some time, and was govLrnor of his State for two years. He died, 
while at Washington, as United States senator, in 1808, and hia remains are m the Congressional 
burial-ground. See his portrait on page 347. 

* Vergennes, the French minister, was dissatisfied with the manner in which the matter had 
been conducted. It was understood, by the terms of the alliance between the United States and 
France (and expressly stated in the instructions of the commissioners), that no treaty should be 
signed by the latter without the knowledge of the other. Tet it was done on this occasion. A 
portion of the American commissioners doubted the good faith of Yergennes, because he favored 
Spanish claims. Dr. Franklin, however, trusted Yergennes impMcitlj-, and the latter appears to 
have acted honorably, throughout. The cloud of dissatisfaction soon passed away, when Franklin, 
with soft words, explained the whole matter. 

» It was signed, on the part of England, by David Hartley, and on that of the United States, by 
Dr. Franklin, John Adams, and John Jay. 



1789.] CLOSING EVENTS OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 349 

and westward to the Mississippi, and an unlimited right of fishing on the banks 
of Newfoundland. The two Floridas were restored to Spain. At the same 
time, definitive treaties between England, France, Spain, and Holland, were 
signed bj their respective commissioners,' and the United States became an 
active power among the nations of the earth." 

A great work had now been accomplished, yet the joy of the American 
people, in view of returning peace and prosperity, was mingled with many 
gloomy apprehensions of evil. The army, which, through the most terrible 
sufierings, had remained faithful, and become conqueror, was soon to be dis- 
banded ; and thousands, many of them made invalids by the hard service in 
which they had been engaged, would be compelled to seek a livelihood in the 
midst of the desolation which war had produced.^ For a long time the public 
treasury had been empty, and neither officers nor soldiers had received any pay 
for their services. A resolution of Congress, passed in 1780 [October 21], to 
allow the officers half pay for life, was ineffective, because funds were wanting. 
Already the gloomy prospect had created wide-spread murmurings in the army, 
and there were many men who sighed for a stronger government. They ascribed 
the weakness of the Confederation to its republican form, and a change, to be 
wrought by the army, was actually proposed to Washington. Nicola, a foreign 
officer in a Pennsylvania regiment, made the proposition, in a well-written letter, 
and not only urged the necessity of a monarchy, but endeavored to persuade 
Washington to become king, by the voice of the army. The sharp rebuke of the 
commander-in-chief [May, 1 782] , checked all further movements in that direction. 

The general discontent soon assumed another shape, and on the 11th of 
March, 1783, a well-written address was circulated through the American camp 
(then near Newburg), which advised the army to take matters into its own 
hands, make a demonstration that should arouse the fears of the people and of 
Congress, and thus obtain justice for themselves.* For this purpose a meeting 
of officers was called, but the great influence of Washington prevented a 
response. The commander-in-chief then summoned all the officers together, 
laid the matter before them [March 15], and obtained from them a patriotic 
expression of their faith in the "justice of Congress and the country." In a 
few days the threatening cloud passed away, and soon after this event Congress 
made arrangements for granting to the officers fall pay for five years, instead 
of half pay for life ; and to the soldiers full pay for four months, in partial 
liquidation of their claims. This arrangement was not satisfactory, and discon- 

' That between Great Britain and Holland was signed on the second. 

' John Adams was the first minister of the United States to Great Britain. He was politely 
received by King George the Third ; and that monarch was faithful to his promises to preserve 
inviolate the covenant he had made by acknowledging the independence of the new Republic. 

^ The army, consisting of about ten thousand men, was then encamped on the Hudson, near 
Newburg. 

* This address was anonymous, but it was afterward acknowledged to be the production of John 
Armstrong, then a major, and one of General Gates's aids. It is believed that Gates and other 
officers were the instigators of the scheme, and that Armstrong acted under tlieir direction. He 
was an accomplished ^vrite^, and was mucli in public life after the war. He was United States min- 
ister to France for six years, from 1804. He was Secretary of "War in 1814 ; and died iu Duche^:3 
county, New York, in 1843, in the eighty-fifth year of his age. 



350 THE REVOLUTION. [1782. 

tent still prevailed.' In the mean while [March 2] the preliminary treaty had 
arrived. On the eighth anniversary of the skirmish at Lexington [April 19, 
1783], a cessation of hostilites was proclaimed in the army, and on the 3d of 
November following, the army was disbanded by a general order of Congress. A 
small force was retained under a definite enlistment, until a peace establishment 
should be organized.'* These were now at West Point, under the command of 
General Knox. The remainder of that glorious band of patriots then quietly 
returned to their homes, to enjoy, for the remnant of their lives, the blessings of 
the liberty they had won, and the grateful benedictions of their countrymen. 
Of the two hundred and thirty thousand Continental soldiers, and the fifty-six 
thousand militia who bore arms during the war, the names of only two are now 
[1867] on the pension list !' And the average of these must be full ninety years. 
The British army evacuated the city of New York on the 25th of Novem- 
ber, 1783. With their departure, went, forever, the last instrument of royal 
power in these United States. On the morning of that day — a cold, frosty, 
but clear and brilliant morning — the American troops, 
under General Knox,* who had come down from West 
Point and encamped at Harlem, marched to the Bowery 
Lane, and halted at the present junction of Third 
Avenue and the Bowery. Knox was accompanied by 
George Clinton,'' the governor of the State of Nevr 
York, with all the principal civil officers. There they 
remained until about one o'clock in the afternoon, when 
the British left their posts in that vicinity and marched 
to Whitehall." The American troops followed, and 

GOVERNOR CLISTON. 

' In May, 1183, a portion of the Pennsylvania troops, lately arrived from the South, marched 
to Philadelphia, vv^here they were joined by others, and for three hours they stood at the door of the 
State House, and demanded immediate pay from Congress. St. Clair, then in command there, 
pacified tliem for the moment, and "Washington soon quelled the mutiny. See page 328. 

* A great portion of the officers and soldiers had been permitted, during the summer, to visit 
their homes on fiu'lough. The proclamation of discharge, by Congress, was followed by "Washing- 
ton's farewell address to his companions in arms, written at Rocky HiU, New Jersey, on the 3d of 
November. He had already issued a circular letter (Newburg, June 8th, 1783) to the govemorti 
of all the States on the subject of disbanding the army. It was designed to be laid before the sev- 
eral State Legislatures. It is a document of great value, because of the soundness of its doctrines, 
and the weight and wisdom of its counsels. Four great points of policy constitute the chief theme 
of his communication, namely, an indissoluble union of the States ; a sacred regard for public justice ; 
the organization of a proper peace establishment ; and a friendly intercourse among the people of th£ 
several States, by which local prejudice might be effaced. " These," he remarks, " are the pillars on 
which the glorious fabric of our independency and national character must be supported." No 
doubt this address had great influence upon the minds of the whole people, and made them yeam 
for that more efficient union which the Federal Constitution soon afterward secured. 

* Great Britain sent to America, during the war, one hundred and twelve thousand five hun- 
dred and eighty-four troops for the land service, and more than twenty-two thousand seamen. Of 
all this host, not one is known to be living. One of them (Jolm Battin) died in the city of New 
York, in June, 1852, at the age of one hundred years and four months. 

* Henry Knox, the able commander of the artillery during the Revolution, was bom in Boston, 
in 1740. He entered the army at the commencement of the war. He was President "Washington's 
Secretary of "War, and held that office eleven years. He died at Thomaston, in Maine, in 1806. _ 

^ Like Governors Trumbull [page 323] and Rutledge [page 310], Clinton, in a civil capacity, 
was of immense service to the American cause. He was born in Ulster county, New York, in 1739. 
He was governor about eighteen years, and died in 1812, while Vice-President of the United 
Btates. See page 404, * Now the South Ferry to Brooklyn. 




1189.] CLOSING EVENTS OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 351 

before three o'clock General Knox took formal possession of Fort George amid 
the acclaraations of thousands of emancipated freemen, and the roar of artillery 
upon the Battery. 

On Thursday, the 4th of Deceml)er, Washington met his officers, yet re* 




maining in service, at his quarters, corner of Broad and Pearl-streets, New 
York, for the last time. Tlie scene, as described by Marshall,' the best of the 
early biographers of Washington, was one of great tenderness. The commander- 
in-chief entered the room where they were all waiting, and taking a glass of 
wine in his hand, he said, " With a heart full of love and gratitude, I now take 



' John Marshall, th« eminent Chief Justice of the United States, was born in Fauquier county, 
Virginia, in 1755, and was the eldest of fifteen children by the same mother. He entered the mil- 
itary service, in the Virginia militia, against Duninore [page 244], in 1775, and was in the battle at 
the Great Bridge [see page 243]. He remained in service, as an excellent officer, until early in 

1780, when he studied law, and became very eminent in his profession. He was again in the tield in 

1781. In 1782 he was a member of the Virginia Legislature. He was chosen Secretary of War in 
1800, and the next year was elevated to tiie Chief Justiceship of the United States. His LAfe of 
Waihuiglon was published in 1805. Judge Marshall died at Philadelphia in 1835, in the eightieth 
year of his age. He was an exceedingly plain man, in person and habits, and always carried his 
own marketing home in his hands. On one occasion, a young housekeeper was swearing lustily 
because he could not hire a person to carry his turkey home for him. A plain man, standing by 
ollered to perform the service, and when they arrived at the door, the young man asked, "Wliat 
shall I pay you?" "Oh, nothing," replied the old man; "you are welcome; it was on my way, 
and no trouble." " Who is that polite old gentleman who brought home my turkey for me ?" in- 
quired the young man of a bystander. " Tliat," he replied, " is John Marshall, Chief Justice of the 
United States." The astonished youns: man exclaimed, "Why did he bring home my turkey?" 
" To give you a severe reprimand." replied the other, "and to-lwuaj you to attend to your own bus- 
iness." The lesson was never forgotten. J^ X / 



852 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1782. 




leave of you. I most devoutly wish that your latter days may be as prosperous 
and happy as your former ones have been glorious and honorable." Having 
drank, he continued, "I can not come to each of you to take my leave, but 
shall be obliged to you if each will come and take me by the hand." Knox, 
•who stood nearest to him, turned and grasped his hand, and, while the tears 
flowed down the cheeks of each, the commander-in-chief kissed him. This he 
did to each of his officers, while tears and sobs stifled utterance. Washington 
soon left the room, and passing through corps of light infxntry, he walked in 
silence to Whitehall, where he embarked in a barge for Elizabethtown, on his 
way to Annapolis, in Maryland, where Congress was in session. There, on the 
23d of December, he resigned into its custody the com- 
mission w^iich he received [June 16, 1775] from that 
body more than eight years before.' His address on 
that occasion was simple and touching, and the re- 
sponse of General Mifflin,'^ the president, was equally 
affecting. The spectacle was one of great moral sub- 
limity. Like Cincinnatus, Washington, having been 
instrumental, under Providence, in preserving the lib- 
erties of his country and achieving its independence, 
laid down the cares of State and returned to his plow. 

A few months before the final disbanding of the army, many of the officers^ 
then at Newburg, on the Hudson, met [June 19, 1783] at the head-quarters ot 
the Baron Steuben, situated about two miles from the Fishkill 
Ferry, and there formed an association, which they named the 
Society of the Cincinnati. The chief objects of the Society 
were to promote cordial friendship and indissoluble union among 
themselves ; to commemorate, by frequent re-unions, the great 
struggle they had just passed through ; to use their best en- 
deavors for the promotion of human liberty ; to cherish good 
feeling between the respective States ; and to extend benevolent 
aid to those of the Society whose circumstances might require 
it. They formed a General Society, and elected Washington 
its first president. They also made provision for the formation 
of auxiliary State societies. To perpetuate the Association, it 
was provided, in the constitution, that the eldest male descend- 
ant of an original member should be entitled to bear the Order, 
and enjoy the privileges of the Society. The Order" consists 
of a gold eagle, suspended upon a ribbon, on the breast of which is a medallion 



GENERAL MIFFLIN. 




' Page 238. At the same time 'Washington rendered the account current of his expenditures, 
for reconnoitering, traveling, secret service, and miscellaneous expenses, amounting to about 
$74,480. He would receive nothing in compensation for his own services as commander-in-chief 

' Tbomas Mifflin was born in Philadelphia in 1744. He was a Quaker [note 7, page 94], but 
joined the patriot army in 1775, and rapidly rose to the rank of major-general. He was a member 
of Congress after the war, and also governor of Pennsylvania. He died in January, 1800. 

' An or(hr is a badge, or visible token of regard or distinction, conferred upon persons for mer- 
itorious services. On tlie breast of Baron Steuben on page 291, is the order of Fidelity, presented 
to him by Frederic the Great of Prussia, for his services in the army of that monarcL Some of the 




'^^- 



'^BH 



WAoiEnw(&ir®Kr mE^E(BMiiM(& smg C(S)mmis^ 



1789.] CLOSING EVENTS OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 353 

with a device, representing Cincinnatus reseiving the Roman senators.* SeV' 
eral State societies are yet [1883] in existence. 

The war was ended, and peace was guarantied, but the people had much to 
do in the adjustment of public afiixirs, so as to lay the foundations of permanent 
prosperity, and thus secure the liberty and independence proclaimed and 
acknowledged. The country was burdened Avith a heavy debt, foreign and do- 
mestic,* and the Articles of Confederation^ gave Congress no power to dis- 
charge them, if it had possessed the ability. On its recommendation, however, 
the individual States attempted to raise their respective quotas, by direct tax- 
ation. But all were impoverished by the war, and it was found to be impos- 
sible to provide means even to meet the arrears of pay due the soldiers of the 
Revolution. Each State had its local obligations to meet, and Congress could 
not coerce compliance with its recommendations. 

This effort produced great excitement in many of the States, and finally, in 
1786, a portion of the people of Massachusetts openly i-ebelled. Daniel Shays, 
who had been a captain in the continental army, marched at the head of a thou- 
sand men, took possession of Worcester, and prevented a session of the Supreme 
Court. He repeated the same at Springfield. The insurrection soon became 
80 formidable, that Governor Bowdoin was compelled to call out several thou- 
sand militia, under General Lincoln, to suppress it. Lincoln captured one hun- 
dred and fifty of the insurgents, and their power was broken. A free pardon 
was, finally, offered to all privates who had engaged in the rebellion. Several 
leaders were tried, and sentenced to death, but none were executed, for it was 
perceived that the great mass of the people sympathized with them. This epi- 
sode is known as Shays' s Rebellion. 

We have already noticed the fact that the Pope was unfriendly to England,* 
and looked with favor upon the rebellious movements of her colonies. Soon 
after the treaty of peace was concluded [Sept. 3, 1783], the Pope's Nuncio at 
Paris made overtures to Franklin, on the subject of appointing an apostolic 
vicar for the United States. The matter was referred to Congress, and that 
body properly replied, that the subject being purely spiritual, it was beyond 
their control. The idea of entire separation between the State and spiritual 
governments — the full exercise of freedom of conscience — was thus early enun- 



orders conferred by kings are very costly, being made of gold and sUver, and precious stones. The 
picture of the order of the Cincinnati, given on the preceding page, is half the size of the original 

* Cincinnatus was a noble Roman citizen. "When the Romans were menaced with destruction 
by an enemy, the Senate appointed delegates to invite Cincinnatus to assume the cliief magistracy 
of the nation. They found him at his plow. He immediately complied, raised an army, subdued 
the enemy, and, after bearing the almost imperial dignity for fourteen days, he resigned his oflSce, 
and returned to bis plow. How like Cincinnatus were Washington and his compatriots of the War 
for Independence ! 

"^ According to an estimate made by the Register of the Treasury in 1790, the entire cost of the 
War for Independence, was at least one hundred and thirty millions of dollars, exclusive of vast sums 
lost by individuals and the several States, to the amount, probably, of forty millions more. The 
treasury payments amounted to almost ninety-three millions, chiefly in continental bills. The foreiga 
debt amounted to eight millions of dollars ; and the domestic debt, due chiefly to the officers and 
soldiers of the Revolution, was more than thirty millions of rl:3rnr-. 

' Note 1, page 267, and Supplement. * Page 266. 

23 



THE REVOLUTION, 



[1888 



854 

ciated. The Pope accordingly appointed the Reverend Jobn Carroll, of 
Maryland, to the high office of Apostolic- Vicar.* At about the same time, 
the Church of England in the United States sought a re-organization. In 
compliance with the wishes of the Churchmen of Connecticut, the Rev- 
erend Samuel Seabury went to England in 1784, to obtain ordination as 
bishop. The English bishops hesitating to act in consequence of the 
refusal of Seabury to take the oath of allegiance to the king of England 
as head of the Church, he obtained ordination by Scotch bishops at 
Aberdeen.* 




Three years later, the Reverend William White, who had been elected* 
bishop of the diocese of Pennsylvania, was consecrated, (with Bishop 
Provoost, of New York,) by the Archbishop of Canterbury ; ^ and a few 
years later, the independent " Protestant Episcopal Church in the United 
States of America," was established. Such was the commencement of 
two of the most prominent prelatical Churches in this country. The 
Methodist Church, which has since flourished so wonderfully, was then 
just taking firm root. 



i John Carroll was a native of Maryland. He was ordained to the ministry in the Roman 
Catholic Church in 1769 ; was consecrated a bishop in 1790, and made archbishop in 1808. 

2 Samuel Seabury was a native of Connecticut. He entered the ministry in 1758, and became 
the first bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church, in this country, in 1784. 

^William White entered the ministry by ordination in London, in 1770 ; and at one time he 
was chaplain to the Continental Congress. He was consecrated a bishop in 1787, and in 1789 hfl 
presided over the convention called to consider the organization of an American Church. H? 
wrote the constitution of that Chui-ch ; and with the assistance of Bishop Seabury, he revised th^ 
Book of Common Prayer, so as to adapt it to the new order of things. 



1789.] CLOSING EVENTS OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 355 

For a long time it had been clearly perceived that, while the Articles of 
Confederation formed a sufficient constitution of government during the prog- 
Tess of the war, they were not adapted to the public wants in the new condition 
of an independent sovereignty in which the people found themselves. There 
appeared a necessity for a greater centralization of power by which the general 
government could act more efficiently for the public good. To a great extent, 
the people lost all regard for the authority of Congress, and the commercial 
afiairs of the country became wretchedly deranged. In truth, every thing 
seemed to be tending toward utter chaos, soon after the peace in 1783,^ and the 
leading minds engaged in the struggle for Independence, in view of the increas- 
ing and magnified evils, and the glaring defects of the Articles of Confedera- 
tion, were turned to the consideration of a plan for a closer union of the States, 
and for a general government founded on the principles of the Declaration of 
Independence, from which the confederation in question widely departed. 

The sagacious mind of Washington early perceived, with intense anxiety, 
the tendency toward ruin of that fair fabric which his wisdom and prowess had 
helped to rear, and he took the initial step toward the adoption of measures 
which finally resulted in the formation of the present Constitution of the United 
States.'^ At his suggestion, a convention, for the purpose of consulting on the 
best means of remedying the defects of the Federal Government, was held at 
Annapolis, in Maryland, in September, 1786. Only five States (Virginia, 
Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York) were represented. They 
met on the 11th of that month, and John Dickenson' was chosen chairman. 
They finally appointed a committee to prepare a draft of a report to be made to 
the Legislatures of the several States, then represented. The committee 
reported on the 14th, but there not being a representation from a majority of 
the States, it was thought advisable to postpone further action. They adjourned, 
after recommending the appointment of deputies to meet in convention at 
Philadelphia, in May following. The report was adopted and transmitted to 
Congress. On the 21st of February, 1787, a committee of that body,* to whom 
the report of the commissioners was referred, reported thereon, and strongly 
recommended to the diiferent Legislatures to send forward delegates to meet in 
the proposed convention at Philadelphia. Propositions were made by delegates 
from New York and Massachusetts, and finally the following resolution, sub- 
mitted by the latter, after being amended, was agreed to : 

" Resolved, That in the opinion of Congress, it is expedient that on the 
second Monday in May next, a convention of delegates, who shall have been 
appointed by the several States, be held at Philadelphia, for the sole and 
express purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation, and reporting to 
Congress and the several Legislatures such alterations and provisions therein 
as shall, when agreed to in Congress, and confirmed by the States, render the 



' Page 348. « Page 359. ' Page 219. 

* The committee consisted of Messrs. Dana, Vamum, S. M, Mitchell, Smith, Cadwalader, Irvioe^ 
N. Mitchell, Forest, Grayson, Blount, Bull, and Few. 



356 THE REVOLUTION. [1782. 

Federal Constitution adequate to the exigences of the government and the 
preservation of the Union." 

This resolution, with a preamble, was immediately transmitted to the several 
Speakers of State Legislatives Assemblies, and they were laid before the repre- 
sentatives of the people in all the States of the Confederacy. While a feeling 
generally prevailed, that something must be done to avert the threatened anarchy, 
toward which governmental operations were rapidly tending, great caution was 
observed in the delegation of powers to those who should be appointed members 
of the proposed convention.' In May, ITST,"" delegates from all the States, 
except New Hampshire and Rhode Island,' assembled at Philadelphia, in the 
room where Congress was in session when the Declaration of Independence was 
adopted.^ Washington, who was a delegate from Virginia, was, on motion of 
Robert Morris, chosen President. Able statesmen were his associates,^ and they 
entered earnestly upon their duties. They had not proceeded far, however, 
before they perceived that the Articles of Confederation were so radically 
defective, and their powers so inadequate to meet the wants of the country, that, 
instead of trying to amend that old code, they went diligently to work to form 
a new Constitution. For some time they made but little progress. There were 

* The great question that came up before the members, at the very commencement of the session 
of the Convention, was, "What powers do we possess? Can the amendments to the Articles of 
Confederation be carried so far as to establish an entirely new system?" 

' The day fixed for the assembUng of the Convention, was the 14th of May. On that day, del- 
egates from only half the States were present. The remainder of the delegates did not all arrive 
before the 25th. 

* Ignorant and unprincipled men, who were willing to liquidate public and private debts by the 
agency of unstable paper money, controlled the Assembly of Rhode Island, and that body refused 
to elect delegates to the Convention. But some of the best and most influential men in the State 
joined in sending a letter to the Convention, in which they expressed their cordial sympathy with 
the object of that national assembly, and promised their ■adhesion to whatever the majority might 
propose. The following are tlie names of the delegates : 

New Haynj^sMre. — John Langdon, John Pickering, Nicholas Oilman, and Benjamin "West. 

Massachusetts. — Francis Dana, Elbridge Gerry, Nathaniel Gorham, Rufiis King, and Caleb Strong. 

Connecticut. — William Samuel Johnson, Roger Sherman, and Oliver EUsworth. 

New York. — Robert Yates, John Lansing, Jr., and Alexander Hamilton. 

Neio Jersey. — David Brearley, William Churchill Houston, William Paterson, John Neilson, 
William Livingston, Abraham Clark, and Jonathan Dayton. 

Pennsylvania. — Thomas Mifflin, Robert Morris, George Clymer, Jared Ingersoll, Thomas Fitz- 
simmons, James Wilson, Gouverneur Morris, and Benjamin Frankhn. 

Delaware. — George Read, Gunning Bedford, Jr., John Dickenson, Richard Bassett, and Jacob 
Brown. 

Maryland. — James M 'Henry, Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer, Daniel Carroll, John Francis Mercer, 
and Luther Martin. 

Virginia. — George Washington, Patrick Henry, Edmund Randolph, John Blair, James Madison, 
Jr.. George Mason, and George Wythe. Patrick Henry having declined his appointment, James 
M'Clure was nominated to supply his place. 

North Carolina. — Eichard Caswell, Alexander Martin, William Richardson Davie, Richard 
Dobbs Spaight, and Willie Jones. Richard Caswell having resigned, William Bloqnt was appointed 
a deputy in his place. WiUie Jones having also decUned his appointment, his place was supplied by 
Hugh Williamson. 

South Carolina. — John Rutledge, Charles Pinckey, Charles C. Pinckney, and Pierce Butler. 
Georgia. — William Few, Abraham Baldwin, William Pierce, George Walton, WiUiam Houston, 
and Nathaniel Pendleton. * Page 250. 

* The members who were most conspicuous as debaters in the Convention, were Randolph, 
Madison, and Mason, of Yirginia; King, Gerry, and Gorham, of Massachusetts; Gouverneur Mor- 
ris, WOson, and Dr. Franklin, of Pennsylvania ; Johnson, Sherman, and Ellsworth, of Connecticut ; 
Lansing and Hamilton, of New York ; the two Pinckneys, of Sc)Ut]i CaroUna ; Paterson, of New 
Jersey ; Martin, of Maryland ; Dickenson, of Delaware ; and Dr. Wihiamson, of North Carolina. 



■,iiii;lii:;iiiii!:;,:i:,;iii,;;;ii 




Franklin in the National Contention. 



1789.] CLOSING EVENTS OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 350 

great diversities of opinion/ and it seemed, after several dajs, that the conven- 
tion must, of necessity, dissolve without accomplishing any thing. Some pro- 
posed a final adjournment. At this momentous crisis, Dr. Franklin arose, and 
said to the President, "How has it happened, sir, that Avhile groping so long 
in the dark, divided in our opinions, and now ready to separate without accom- 
plishing the great objects of our meeting, that we have hitherto not once thought 
of humbly applying to the Father of Lights to illuminate our understandings ? 
In the beginning of the contest with Britain, when wc were sensible of danger, 
we had daily prayers in this room for divine protection. Our prayers, sir, 
were heard, and graciously answered." He closed by saying, " The longer 
I live the more convincing proofs I see of tlie truth that God governs 
hi the affairs of nien^'' and then moved that "henceforth, prayers, im- 
ploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, 
be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business." 
The resolution was not adopted. On a memorandum of it, Franklin 
wrote, " The Convention, except three or four members, thought prayers 
unnecessary." 

After long and animated debates, the Convention referred all propositions, 
reports, etc., which had been agreed to from time to time, to a Committee of 
Detail, consisting of Rutledge, Randolph, Gorham, Ellsworth,' and Wilson. 
The Convention then adjourned, and ten days afterward [August 6, 1787] it 
met, and that committee reported a rough sketch of the Constitution, as it now 
stands. Now, again, long and sometimes angry delxates were had. Amend- 
ments were made, and all were referred to a committee for final revision. 
That committee submitted the following resolution on the 12th of September, 
which was adopted : 

' Edmund Randolph submitted a plan on the 29th of May, in a series of Resolutions, which was 
known as the " Virginia Plan." It proposed to form a general government, composed of a legislature, 
and an executive and judiciary department ; a revenue, and an army and navy, independent of tha 
control of the several States; to have power to conduct war, estabhsh peace, and make treaties; to 
have the exclusive privilege of coining money, and the general supervision of all national trans- 
actions. Upon general principles, this plan was highly approved ; but in that Convention there 
were many ardent and pure patriots, who looked upon the preservation of the State sovereignties 
as essential, and regarded this proposition as an infringement upon State Rights. Mr. Paterson 
also submitted a plan for amending the Articles of Conftideration. It proposed to enlarge the 
powers of Congress, but left its resources and supplies to be found through the medium of the State 
governments. This was one of the most serious defects of the old League — a dependence of the 
general government upon the State governments for its vitality. Otlier propositions were submitted 
from time to time, and the most intense solicitude was f ^It by every member. Subjects of the most 
vital interest were ably discussed, from day to day ; but none created more earnest debate than a 
proposition for the general government to assume the debts of the States contracted in providing 
means for carrying on the war. The debts of the several States v.'cre unequal. Those of Massa- 
chusetts and South Carolina amouQted to more than ten millions and a half of dollars, while the 
debts of all the other States did not extend, in the aggregate, to fifteen millions. This assumption 
was finally made, to the amount of twentv-one millions five hundred thousand dollars. Sea 
page 370. 

' Oliver Ellsworth was one of the soundest men in the Convention, and wag ever one of the 
most beloved of the New England patriots. He was born in Windsor, Connecticut, in April, 174."). 
He was educated at Yale College, and at Princeton, and at the age of twenty-five, he commenced 
thf) practice of law at Hartford. He was an eloquent speaker, and became very eminent in his 
profession. He was a member of the Continental Congress in 1777, and in 1784 he was appointed 
Judge of the Superior Court of Connecticut. He was the first United States senator from Connect- 
icut, under the new Constitution, and in 1790 he was appointed Chief Justice of ti'e V-<-\txr\ 'S'-atea. 
He was an embassador to the French court from 1799 to 1801. He died iu Novemuw. ISO'- aA 
the age of sixty -two years. See next page. 



360 



THE REYOLUTION. 



[1782. 



*' Resolved u7ianimoushj, That the said report, with the resolutions and 
letters accompanying the same, be transmitted to the several Legislatures, in 
order to be submitted to a convention of delegates chosen in each State by 
the people thereof, in conformity to the resolves of the Convention, made and 
provided, in that case." 




Oc^t^r^^f}^ 



The new Constitution, when submitted to the people,' found many and able 
opposers. State supremacy, sectional interests, radical democracy, all bad nu- 
merous friends, and these formed the phalanx of opposition. All the persuasive 
eloquence of its advocates, with pen and speech, was needed to convince the 
people of its superiority to the Articles of Confederation, and the necessity for 
its ratification. Among its ablest supporters was Alexander Hamilton,^ whose 



' The Convention agreed to the revised Constitution on the 15th of September, and on the 17th 
it was signed by the representatives of all the States then present, except Randolph, Gerry, and 
Mason. The Constitution was submitted to Congress on the 28th, and that body sent copies of it 
to all the State Legislatures. State Conventions were then called to consider it ; and more than a 
year elapsed before the requisite number of States had ratified it. These performed that act in the 
following order: Delaware, Dec. 7, 1787; Pennsylvania, Dec. 12, 1787; New Jersey, Dec. 18, 
1787; Georgia, Jan. 2, 1788; Connecticut, Jan. 9, 1788; Massachusetts, Feb. 6, 1788; Maryland, 
April 28, 1788; South Carolina, May 23, 1788; New Hampshire, June 21, 1788; Virginia, June 
25, 1788; New York, July 26, 1788; North Carolina, Nov. 21, 1788; Rhode Island, May 29, 
1790. 

* Alexander Hamilton was bom on the Island of Nevis, British West Indies, in January, 1757. 
He was of Scotch and French parentage. He became a clerk to a New York merchant at St 
Croix, and he was finally brought to New York to be educated. He was at King's (now Columbia) 
College, and was distinguished as a good speaker and writer, while yet a mere lad. When the Rev- 
olution broke out, he espoused the Republican cause, entered the army, became Washington's favor- 
ite aid and secretary, and was an efficient officer until its close. He made the law his profession, 
fcad, as an able financier, he was made the first Secretary of the Treasury, under the new Constltu- 



1189.] CLOSING EVENTS OF THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 361 

pen and sword had been identified with the career of Washington during almost 
the whole War for Independence. He gave to its advocacy the whole weight of 
his character and power of his genius : and, aided by Jay and Madison, he scat- 
tered broadcast among the people, those able papers called Thi Federalist. 
These, like Paine's Crisis, stirred the masses ; and soon eleven States^ in Con- 




vention assembled, gave the National Constitution their support, and ratified 
it. Congress then fixed the time for choosing electors for President and Vice- 
President,* and provided for the organization of the new government. Oa 
Wednesday, the 4th day of March, 1 789, the old Continental Congress' ex- 
pired, and the National Constitution became the organic law of the 
Republic. This was the crowning act of the War for Independence,' and 
then the United States of America commenced their glorious career as a 
powerful empire among the nations of the earth. 



tion. He was shot in a duel, by Aaron Burr, in July, 1804, at the early age of forty-seven years. 
His widow, daughter of General Schuyler, died in November, 1854, in the ninety-seventh year of 
her age. 

' These are men elected by the people in the various States, to meet and choose a President and 
Vice-President of the United States. Their number is equal to the whole number of Senators and 
Representatives to which the several States are entitled. So the people do not vote directly for the 
Chief Magistrate. Formerly, the man who received the highest number of votes was declared to 
be President, and he who received the next highest number was proclaimed Vice-President. Now 
these are voted for as distinct candidates for separate oflBces. See Article II. of the National Con- 
stitution, Supplement. The first electors were chosen on the first Wednesday in February, 1789. The 
ins uguration of the first President did not take place [page 366] until the 30th of April following, 

' Page 226. 

' For details of the history, biography, scenery, relics, and traditions of the War for Independ- 
ence, see Lossing's Pictorial Field Book of the Revolution. 



362 



THE REVOLUTION. 



[1182. 



Congress was in session at New York while the Convention at Philadelphia 
was busy in preparing the National Constitution. During that time it disposed 
of the subject of organizing a Territorial Government for the vast region north- 
ward of the Ohio River, within the domain of the United States." On the 11th 
of July, 1787, a committee of Congress reported " An Ordinance for the Gov- 
ernment of the Territory of the United States North-west of the Ohio." This 







report embodied a bill, whoso provisions in regard to personal liberty and distri- 
bution of property, were very important. It contained a special proviso that 
the estates of all persons dying intestate, in the territory, should be equally 
divided among all the children, or next of kin in equal degree, thus striking 
down the unjust law of primogeniture, and asserting a more republican prin- 
ciple. The bill, also, provided and declared, that "there shall be neither 
slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory, otherwise than in the 
punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted." This 
ordinance was adopted on the 13th, after adding a clause relative to the reclam- 
ation of fugitives from labor, similar to that iacorporated in tbe National Con- 
stitution a few weeks later. ^ 

This ordinance, together with the fact that Indian titles to seventeen mil. 
lions of acres of laud in that region, had been lately extinguished by treaty 



Page 390. 



" See the National Constitution, Article IV.. Section 2. Clause, 3. 



1789.J CLOSING EVENTS OP THE WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 368 

with several of the dusky tribes/ caused a sudden and great influx of immi- 
grants into the country along the northern banks of the Ohio. Manasseh Cut- 
ler, Rufus Putnam, Winthrop Sargent, and other New Englanders, organized 
the " Ohio Company," and entered into a contract for the sale of a tract of five 
millions of acres, extending along the Ohio from the Muskingum to the Scioto." 
. A similar contract was entered into with John Cleves Symmes, of New Jersey,. 
for the sale of two milhons of acres, between the Great and Little Miamis. 
These were the first steps taken toward the settlement of the vast North-ivest 
Territory, which embraced the present States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Mich- 
igan, and Wisconsin. It was estimated that, during the year following the- 
organization of that Territory [1788], full twenty thousand men, women, and 
children had passed down the Ohio River, to become settlers upon its banks. 
Since, then, how wonderful has been the progress of settlement beyond the 
Alleghanies ! How wide and deep has been the ever-flowing tide of emigration, 
thither ! The original thirteen States have new [1883] expanded into 
THiRTT-EiGHT, and vast territories, destined to become numerous other States, 
are rapidly filling with people.' 



' The Six Nations [page 25], the Wyandots [page 23], the Delawares [page 20], and the- 
Sha-wnees [page 19]. 

' Rufus Putnam, who had been an active ofBcer daring the War for Independence, -was one of 
the most efficient of the Ohio settlers. He was born in Worcester county, Massachusetts, in 1738. 
He entered the provincial army in 1757, and continued in service during the remainder of the 
French and Indian War. He entered the army of the Revolution in 1775, and at near the close of 
the war, he was promoted to brigadier-general He went to the Ohio country, -with about forty 
settlers, in 1788. They pitched their tents at the mouth of the Muskingum River, formed a settle- 
ment, and called it Marietta. Suspicious of the Indians, they built a stockade, and called it Canpm 
Martim. In 1 7 80, President Washington commissioned General Putnam Supreme Judge of the North- 
west Territory; and in 1792, he was appointed a brigadier, under Wayne. He was appointed sur- 
veyor-general of the United States in 1796; helped to frame the Constitution of Ohio in 1802 ; and 
then retired to private life. He died at Marietta in 1824. at the age of eighty-six years. He is 
called the Father of Ohio. 

8 The following table gives the names, in alphabetical order, of the States that compose the 
Republic, at this time [1883], with the area of each in square miles, and its population in 1880 r 

States. Area, 



States. 


Area. 


Population. 


Alabama 


50,722 


1,202,505 


Arkansas 


52,198 


802,525 


California 


188,981 


864,694 


Colorado 


104,5uO 


194.327 


Connecticut 


. . 4,750 


622,700 


Delaware 


2.120 


146,608 


Plorida 


59,248 


269,493 


Georgia 

Illinois 


.... 58,000 


1,.542.180 


.55,410 


3,677,871 


Indiana 


. ... 33,809 


1,978,.30I 


Iowa 


55,045 


1,624,615 


Kansas 


. .. 81,318 


996,096 


Kentucky. 


37,680 


1,648,690 




41,348 


939,946 


Maine 


35,000 


648,9.36 


Maryland 


11,124 


934,943 


Massachusetts 


. ... 7,800 


1,783,085 


Micliigan 


56,451 


1,6.36,9.37 


Minnesota 


83,531 


780,773 



Mississippi 47,156 

Missouri 65,350 

Nebraslia 75,995 

Nevada .* 81,531 

New Hampsliire 9,280 



New Jert<ey. 
New York. 



8,320 
47,000 
50,704 



North Carolina 

Ohio 30,964 

Oregon 95,274 

Pennsylvania 46,000 

Rhode Island 1,306 

South Carolina 34,r00 

Tennessee 4.5,600 

Texas 274,.3.56 

Vermont 10,2!2 

Virginia 38,352 

West Virginia. 23,000 

Wisconsin 53,924 



Population, 
1,131.507 
2,168,.3SQ 

452,403 
62,266. 

346.991 
1,131,11& 
5,082,871 
1,399,750' 
3,198,062 

174.768 
4,282,801 

27(i,.531 

90.-), 577 
1,542,.3.59' 
1,591,749 

a32.286. 
1,512,.565 

618,4.57 
1.315,497 



There are also eight organized Territories, in which population is rapidly increasing. Those- 
are Arizona, Dakota, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Utah. Washington, and Wyoming Ter. 
The aggregate area of these Territories is 906.6.50 square miles, and the aggregate population 
in 1880 was 586.819 ; making the grand total of the area of the Eepublic 3,002,013, and of 
population 50,1.55,783 ; besides these there is the District of Columbia, an Indian Territory,, 
and Alaska. 




GOUVERNEUR MORRIS. 



SIXTH PERIOD. 

THE NATION. 

CHAPTEE I. 

WASHINGTON'S ADMINISTRATION. 

1789—1797. 

When the National Constitution^ had 
received the approval of the people, and 
was made the supreme law of the Repub- 
lic, all minds and hearts seemed spontaneously turned toward Washington as 
the best man to perform the responsible duties of chief magistrate of the nation. 
On the 6th of April, 1789, he was chosen President of the United States by 
the unanimous vote of the electors,* and John Adams was made Vice-President. 
The journey of Washington from Mount Vernon to New York, was like a 
triumphal march. He had scarcely left his porter's lodge, when he was met 
by a company of gentlemen from Alexandria, who escorted him to that town. 
Everywhere the people gathered to see him as he passed along the road. Towns 
eent out committees to receive him, and public addresses and entertainments 



' "We have observed that Gouverneur Morris was one of the committee to make the final revision 
of the Constitution. The committee placed it in his hands, and that instrument, in language and 
general arrangement, is the work of that eminent man. Gouverneur Morris was born near New 
York, in 1752. He was a lawyer, and was always active in public life. In 1792 he was appointed 
minister to France, and after his return he was a legislator for many years. He died In 1816. 

" Note 1, page 361. 



1789.] 



WASHINGTON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



365 



■were given in his honor, in many places. Militia companies escorted him from 
place to place, and firing of cannons and ringing of bells, announced his approach 
to the large towns. At Trenton, his reception was peculiar and gratifying. It 
■was arranged by the ladies. Over Trenton bridge an arch was thrown, which 
was adorned with laurel leaves and flowers from the conservatories. Upon the 




crown, and formed of leaves and flowers, were the words, " December 26, 
1776 ;" ' and on the sweep beneath was the sentence, also formed of flowers : 
" The Defender of the Mothers will be the Protector of the 
Daughters." Beneath that arch the President was met by a troupe of 
females. As he approached, a group of little girls, bearing each a basket, 
commenced strewing flowers in the road, and the whole company, young and 
old, joined in singing the following ode, written for the occasion by Governor 
Howell: 

" Welcome, mighty chief, once more 
Welcome to this grateful shore. 
Now no mercenary foe 
Aims again the fatal blow — 

Aims at Thee the fatal blow. 
Virgins fair and matrons grave, 
Those thy conquering arm did save, 
Build for thee triumphal bowers — 
Strew your hero's way with flowers!" 



S66 



THE NATION. 



[1789. 



Washington reached New York on the 23d of April, 1789. On the 
30th he appeared upon the street-gallery of the old City Hall' in New York 
and there, in the presence of an immense concourse of people assembled in 
front, the oath of office was administered to him by Chancellor Livingston.' 




After delivering an impressive address to the members of both Houses of Con- 
gress, the President and the representatives of the people went in solemn pro- 
cession to St. Paul's Church, and there invoked the blessings of the Supreme 
Ruler upon the new government just inaugurated. 

Men were never called upon to perform duties of greater responsibility, than 
those which demanded the consideration of Washington and his compeers. The 
first session of Congress^ was chiefly occupied in the organization of the new 
government, and in the elaborating of schemes for the future prosperity of the 
Republic. The earliest efforts of that body were directed to the arrangement 
of a system of revenues, in order to adjust and regulate the wretched financial 

' It stood on the site of the present Custom House, comer of "Wall and Broad-streets. In the 
picture on page 364, a correct representation of its street-gallery is given. 

' One of the committee [note 2, page 251] to draft the Declaration of Independence. He was 
born in New York in 1747, became a lawyer, and was always an active public man. He was 
minister to France in 1801, when he purchased Louisiana for the United States. See page 390. He 
joined Robert Fulton in steamboat experiments [page 398j, and died in 1813. 

^ Members of the House of Representatives are elected to seats for two years, and they 
usually hold two sessions or sittings during that time. Each full term is called a Congress. 
There are usually two sessions of each Congress, both commencing on the first Monday in De- 
cember, and the last ending on the 3d of March. Senators are elected by the Stat© liegidlaturea. 



1797.] WASHINGTON'S ADMINISTRATION. 367 

affairs of the country." This subject was brought forward by Madison,^ the 
tacitly acknowledged leader in the House of Representatives, two days after the 
votes for President and Vice-President had been counted. Pursuant to his sug- 
gestion, tonnage duties were levied, and also a tariff, or duties upon foreign 
goods imported into the Uniteii States. These duties were made favorable to 
American shipping. This was the commencement of our present, though con- 
sidei'ably modified, revenue system. 

Having made provision for the collection of revenue. Congress next turned 
its attention to the reorganization of the executive departments. Three — Treas- 
ury, War, and Foreign Affairs — were created, the heads of which were to be 
styled secretaries, instead of ministers, as in Europe. These the President 
might appoint or dismiss with the concurrence of the Senate. They were to 
constitute a cabinet council, always ready for consultation with the President, 
on public affairs, and bound to give him their opinions in writing, when 
required. 

It may be instructive to take a brief retrospective view of the progress of 
legislative action concerning the commerce of the United States from the close 
of the Revolution until the time in question. In March, 1783, the younger 
Pitt"* proposed in the British Parliament, a scheme for the temporary regulation 
of commercial intercourse between Great Britain and the United States. Its 
chief feature was the free admission into the Britisli West India ports of American 
vessels laden with the products of American industry — the West India people, 
in turn, to be allowed like free trade with the United States. The. proposition 
was rejected, and soon an order went forth from the Privy Council,^ for the 
entire exclusion of American vessels from West India ports, and prohibiting the 
importation there of several products of the United States, even in British bot- 
toms. Notwithstanding this unwise and narrow policy was put in force, Mr. 
Adams, the American minister at the court of St. James, proposed, in 1785, 
to place the navigation and trade between all the dominions of the British crown 
and all the territories of the United States, upon a basis of perfect reciprocity. 
This generous offer was not only declined, but the minister was haughtily 
assured that no other would be entertained. Whereupon Mr. Adams imme- 
diately recommended the United States to pass navigation acts for the benefit 
of their commerce. 

Some individual States attempted to legislate upon commercial matters 
and the subject of duties for revenue, but their efforts were comparatively 
fruitless. The importance of having the united action of all the States, in 
framing general navigation laws, was clearly perceived, and this perception wa* 
one of the chief causes which led to the Convention that formed the National 
Constitution.* The new government was inaugurated in due time, and, as we 
have mentioned, the earliest efforts of Congress, under the new order of things, 
were the consideration of schemes fir imposing discriminating duties." These 

* Page 353. ' Note 5, page 356. ' Page 217. 

* Note 1, page 400. * Page 355. ' Page 366. 



368 THE NATION. [1789. 

measures immediately opened the blind eyes of British legislators to the neces- 
sity of a reciprocity in trade between the two countries. They saw that Amer- 
ican commerce was no longer at the mercy of thirteen distinct legislative bodies, 
as under the old Confederation, nor subject to the control of the king and his 
council. They perceived that its interests were guarded and its strength nur- 
tured, by a central power, of wonderful energy, and soon haughty Britain 
became the suppliant. Soon after the passage of the revenue laws by Con- 
gress, a committee of Parliament proposed to ask the United States to con- 
sent to an arrangement precisely the same as that suggested by Mr. Adams, 
six years before, which was so scornfully rejected. The proposition was met 
by generous courtesy on the part of the United States ; yet it was not until 
1816, when the second war for Independence' had been some time closed, that 
reciprocity treaties fairly regulated the commerce between the two countries. 

During the period here referred to, another great commercial interest, then 
in embryo, was under contemplation and discussion, by a few men of forecast. 
It was that of the production of Cotton. Primarily it is an agricultural inte- 
rest, but now, when a large portion of the cotton used in Europe is grown 
in the United States, it has become a groat commercial interest. Among the first 
and most powerful advocates of the cultivation of this plant, was Tench Coxe,'' of 
Philadelphia, who, as early as 1*785, when he was only thirty years of age, pub' 
lished the fiict that he " felt pleasing convictions that the United States, in its 
extensive regions south of Anne Arundel and Talbot counties, Maryland, would 
certainly become a great cotton-producing country." And while the National 
Convention was in session in Philadelphia, in 1 T87,^Mr. Coxe delivered a powerful 
public address on that and kindred subjects, having for his object the establishment 
of a society for the encouragement of manufactures and the useful arts. Before 
that time, not a bale of cotton had ever been exported from the United Statea 
to any other country, and no planter had adopted its cultivation, as a " crop." * 

The Senate was engaged upon the important matter of a National judiciary, 
while the Houg<9 was employed on the Revenue bills. A plan, embodied in a 
bill drafted by Ellsworth of Connecticut,^ was, after several amendments, con* 
curred in by both Houses. By its provisions, a national judiciary was estab- 
lished, consisting of a supreme court, having one chief justice, and five associate 

» Page 409. 

^ Tench Coxe was born in Philadelphia, in May, 1155, and, as we have mentioned in the text, 
was one of the earliest advocates of the cotton culture. From 1787 until his death, there was 
never an important industrial movement in which he was not greatly interested, or in which his 
name did not appear prominent. In 1791, while lie was the Commissioner of Revenue, at Phila- 
delphia, he published a large octavo volume, containing his views, as expressed in speech and 
writing, on the subject of the cotton culture. In 180G, he published an essay on naval power 
and the encouragement of manufactures. The following year he published an essay on the culti- 
vation of cotton, and from time to time thereafter, he wrote and published his views on these 
subjects. He died in July, 1824, at the age of more than sixty-eight years. See next page. 

^ Page 356. 

* It has been estimated that the entire produce of cotton, in all countries, in 1791, was four hun- 
dred and ninety millions of pounds, and tliat the United States produced only one twenty -fifth of 
the entire quantity. In the years 1859-60, the ten cotton-growing States of the Union produced 
four millions, six hundred and seventy-five thousand, seven hundred and seventy bales, of four 
hundred pounds each, making an aggregate of 1,870,680,000 pounds. The whole world did not. 
produce aslhuch cotton as tliis, annually, previous to the year 1840, * Page 360. 



179?.? 



WASHINGTON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



369 



justices, who were to hold two sessions annually, at the seat of the National 
Government.' Circuit and district courts were also established, which had ju- 
risdiction over certain specified cases. Each State was made a district, as were 
also the Territories of Kentucky' and Maine. ^ The districts, except Kentucky 




and Maine, were grouped together into three circuits. An appeal from these 
lower courts to the Supreme Court of the United States, was allowed, as to 
points of law, in all civil cases when the matter in dispute amounted to two 
thousand dollars. A marshal was to be appointed by the President, for each 
district, having the general powers of a sheriff, who was to attend all courts, 
and was authorized to serve all processes. A district attorney, to act for the 
United States in all cases in which the National Government might be inter- 
ested, was also to be appointed for each district. Such, in brief outline, and 
in general terms, Avas the National judiciary, organized at the commencement 
of the Government, and still in force, with slight modifications. 

The next business of importance that engaged the attention of Congress, 



' John Jay [page 379] of New York, one of the most active and acute lawyers in the counti^ 
was apppointed the first Chief Justice of the United States ; and Edmund Randolph, of Virginia, 
was made Attorney-General. Randolph succeeded Patrick Henry as governor of Virginia, in 1786, 
and was very active in the Convention of 1787. See note 1, page 359. He succeeded Jefferson as 
Secretary of State, and died in 1813. John Rutledge [page 210], of South Carolina ; James Wilson, 
of Pennsylvania ; William Cushing, of if assachusetts ; Robert H. Harrison, of Maryland ; and John 
Blair, of Virginia, were appointed associate judges. " Page 377. * Page 452. 

24 



370 THE NATION. [1789. 

was the proposed amendmsnts to the National Constitution, made bv the minor- 
ities of the several conventions which ratified that instrument. This subject 
■was brought forward by Madison, in justice to these minorities, and pursuant 
to pledges which he had found it necessary to give, in order to secure its ratifi- 
cation in Virginia. These amounted, in the aggregate, to one hundred and 
forty-seven,' besides separate bills of rights proposed by Virginia and New 
York. Many of these amendments were identical in spirit, as, for example, the 
nine propositions by Massachusetts were repeated by New Hampshire. And it 
is a singular fiict, that of all the proposed amendments, not one, judged by sub- 
sequent experience, was of a vital character. How well this illustrates the 
profound wisdom embodied in our Constitution ! Sixteen amendments were 
finally agreed to by Congress, ten of which were subsequently ratified by the 
States, and became a part of the Supreme Law.* After a session of almost 
3ix months. Congress adjourned," on the 29th of September [1789], and Wash- 
ington, having appointed his cabinet council,^ made a brief tour through the 
jiorthern and eastern States, to make himself better acquainted with the people 
j,nd their resources.^ 

On the 8th of January, 1790, the second session of the first Congress com- 
jtienced, daring which Alexander Hamilton," the first Secretary of the Treasury, 
made some of those able financial reports which established the general line of 
lational policy for more than twenty years. On his recommendation, the gen- 
oral government assumed the public foreign and domestic debt incurred by the 
late war,'' and also the State debts contracted during that period. The foreign 
debt, including interest, due to France and to private lenders in Holland, with 
a small sum to Spain, amounted to $11,710,378. The domestic debt, regis- 
tered and unregistered, including interest, and some claims, principally the out- 
standing continental money,^ amounted to $42,414,085. Nearly one third of 
L,his was the arrears of interest. As the government certificates, continental 

' The minority of the Pennsylvania Convention proposed 14; of Massachusetts, 9; of Maryland, 
.28; of South Carolina, 4; of New Hampshire, 12; of Virginia, 20; of New York, 32. 
' See Supplement. 

^ A few days before the adjournment, a resolution was adopted, requesting the President of the 
United States to recommend a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by the people 
jf the nation, in acknowledgment of the many signal favors of the Almighty, in permitting them to 
establish, in peace, a free gove^'ument. 

* Alexander Hamilton was appoii^t?'^ Secretary of the TreasuTJ , 
Henry Knox, Secretary of War; and Thoma» J-^fferson, Secretary 
of Foreign Affairs. Jefferson was then United States minister at the 
court of France, and did not enter upon his duties until March, 1790. 
The office of Secretary of the Navy was not created until the pres- 
idency of Mr. Adams. Naval affairs were under the control of the 
Secretary of War. General Kno.x was one of the most efficient 
officers of the Revolution, having, from the beginning, the chief com- 
mand of the artillery. He entered the army as captain of artillery, 
and rose to the rank of major-general. Note 4, page 350. 

^ Washington was everywhere received with great honors ; and 

Trumbull, author of 3PFingal, wrote to his friend, Oliver Wolcott; 

GENERAL KNOX. " We have gone through all the popish grades of worship ; and the 

President returns all fragrant -nitli the odor of incense." 
Jfote 2, page 360. 

Note 2, page 253. In that note the amount given is the principal, without the interest. 
Page 241. 




1791.] WASHINGTON'S ADMINISTRATION. 37X 

bills, and other evidences of debt, were now held chiefly hj speculators, who 
had purchased them at reduced rates, the idea had been put forth bj prominent 
men, that it would be proper and expedient to apply a scale of depreciation, as 
in the case of the paper money toward the close of the war, ' in liquidating these 
claims. But Hamilton opposed it as dishonest and impolitic, arguing, in sup- 
port of the latter objection, that public credit was essential to the new Federal 
Government. He therefore urged that all the debts of the government should 
be met according to the terms of the contract. He proposed the funding of the 
public debt, in a fair and economical way, by which the public creditors should 
receive their promised six per cent, interest, until the Government should be 
able to pay the principal, the Secretary assuming that, in five years, the 
United States might effect loans at five, and even at four per cent., with which 
these claims might be liquidated. He proposed to have the proceeds of the 
post-ofiice" as a sinking fund, for the gradual extinction of the debt. After 
much debate, the propositions of Hamilton, in general, were agreed to by Con- 
gress, on the 9th of March, 1790.' A system of revenue from imposts and 
internal excise, proposed by Hamilton, was also adopted. A petition from 
the Society of Friends, or Quakers, presented on the 11th of February, on the 
subject of slavery, caused long, and, sometimes, acrimonious debates. An act 
was also passed, during this session, making the District of Columbia the per- 
manent seat of the National Goveniment, after the lapse of ten years from that 
datp. 

The First Congress commenced its third session* in December, 1790, and 
before its close, measures were adopted which laid the foundations of public 
credit and national prosperity, deep and abiding. During the two years in 
which the new government had been engaged in the business of organization, a 
competent revenue had been provided for ; the public debt, national and State, 
had been funded, and the interest thereon had been provided for ; a national 
judiciary, wise in all its features, had been established; and the nation, in 
its own estimation and that of other States of the world, had taken a proud 
position in the great political family. North Carolina [Nov. 21, 1789] and 
Rhode Island [M:iy 29, 1790], had already become members of the National 
Union, by ratifying the Constitution ;^and during this session, Vermont'' had been 
admitted [February 18, 1791] as a State. Settlements were now rapidly, 
spreading beyond the Alleghanies,' and the subject of territorial organizations 

' Note 3, page 245. "^ Page 373. 

^ The President was authorized to borrow $12,000,000, if necessary, to payoff the foreign debt; 
and a new loan was to be opened, payable in certificates, of tlie domestic debt, at their par value, 
and in continental bills of credit, at the rate of one hundred for one. Congress also authorized an 
additional loan, payable in certificates of the State debts, to the amount of $21,500,000. These 
certificates were those which had been issued for services or supplies, during the war. A new- 
board of commissioners was appointed, with full power to settle all claims on general principles of 
equity. * Note 3, page 366. * Page 360. 

* Vermont was originally called the Miv Hampshire Grants, and was claimed by both New 
York and New Hampshire. In 1777, the people met in convention, and proclaimed the territory 
an independent State. After purchasing the claims of New York for $30,000, it was admitted into 
the Union. 

' The first census, or enumeration of the inhabitants of the United States, was completed in 
1791. The number of all sexes and colors, was 3,929,000. The number of slaves was 095,000. 



3';j'2 the nation. [1789. 

Tfas pressed upon the consideration of Congress. Already the North-ioestern 
Territory J as we have seen,' had been established [July, 1787J, and Tennessee 
had been constituted [March 26, 1790] the Territory South-ivest of the Ohio.'' 

The subject of a national currency early engaged the attention of Congress, 
and at the commencement of the last session of the First Congress, a bill for 
the establishment of a national bank was introduced into the Senate, in accord- 
ance with the suggestion and plan of Hamilton. At that time the whole bank- 
ing capital in the United States was only $2,000,000, invested in the Bank of 
North America^ at Philadelphia, established by Robert Morris ;' the Bank of 
Neiv York, in New York city, and the Bank of Massachusetts, in Boston. 
The charter was limited to twenty years ; its location was to be in the city of 
Philadelphia, and its management to be intrusted to twenty-five directors. 
Although chartered in January, 1791, the National Bank did not commence 
its operations, in corporate form, until in February, 1794, when it began with 
a capital of $10,000,000. 

Early in the first session of the second Congress, the important subject of 
a national mint received the attention of the representatives of the people. That 
subject had been frequently discussed. As early as 1782, the topic of coins 
and currency had been presented to the Continental Congress, by Gouverneur 
Morris, in an able report, written at the request of Robert Morris. In 1784, 
Mr. Jefferson, as chairman of a committee appointed for the purpose, submitted 
a report, agreeing with Morris in regard to a decimal system, but entirely dis- 
agreeing Avith him in the details.^ He proposed to strike four coins, namely, 
a golden piece of the value of ten dollars ; a dollar, in silver ; a tenth of a dol- 
lar, in silver; and a hundredth of a dollar, in copper. In 1785, Congress 
adopted INIr. Jefferson's report, and made legal provision, the following year, 
for a coinage upon that basis. This was the origin of our ce7it, dime, dollar, 
and eagle. Already several of the States had issued copper coins ;' but the 
National Constitution vested the right of coinage solely in the General Govern- 
ment. The establishment of a Mint was delayed, hovrever, and no special action 
in that direction was taken until 1790, Avhen Mr. Jefferson, then Secretary of 

» Page 362. 

* The subject of the pubUc lands of the United States has always been one of interest. The 
first act of Congress, on the subject of limited sales, was in accordance with a scheme proposed by 
Hamilton, in 1790, which provided in some degree for the protection of small purchasers. Previous 
to that, not less than a tract of four thousand acres could be purchased. This was calculated to 
make labor subservient to wealth, in new settlements. Hamilton's scheme was highly approved. 
The minimum price of public land, previous to 1800, was two dollars per acre ; since then, one dol- 
lar and twenty-five cents. The extent of the public domain has greatly increased, by accessions, 
within a few years. At the close of 1855, there remained unsold about 96,000,000 of acres of sur- 
veyed public domain, and of the unsurveyed, about 136,000,000 of acres, worth, in the aggregate, 
about $276,000,000. The average cost to tne government, per acre, of acquiring title, surveying, 
selling, and managing, is about 22 cents per acre, while it sells at $1.25 per acre, or a net profit of 
$1.03. " 3 Note 3, page '?63. 

* Morris attempted to harmonize the moneys of all the States. Starting with an ascertained 
fraction as an unit, for a divisor, he proposed the following table of moneys : 

Ten units to be equal to one penny. 
Ten pence to one bill. 

Ten bills one dollar (or about seventy-five cents of our currency). 
Ten dollars one crown. 
» Note 4, page 122. 



1797.] WASHINGTON'S ADMINISTRATION. 37^ 

State, urged the matter upon the attention of Congress. Still there was delay, 
until on the 2d of April, 1792, laws were enacted for the establishment of a 
Mint. During three years from that time, its operations were chiefly experi- 
mental, and long debates were had concerning the devices for the new coins.' 
The Mint was finally put into full operation, in 1795," and has continued to 
increase in its issues of coin, ever since.^ 

A bill for the organization of a post-office system, was passed during the 
same session that measures were adopted for the establishment of a Mint. Very 
soon after the commencement of the first session of the first Congress, a letter 
was received from Ebenezer Hazzard [July 17, 1789], then postmaster-general 
under the old Confederation, suggesting the importance of some new regula- 
tions for that department. A bill for the temporary establishment of the post 
office was passed soon afterward. The subject was brought up, from time to 
time, until the present system was organized in 1792. The postmaster-general 
was not made a cabinet officer until the first year [1829] of President Jack- 
son's administration.* 

British agents on the north-western frontier continued to tamper with the 
Indians, and excite them to hostilities against the United States, for several 
years after the peace of 1783.^* And, contrary to the terms of that treaty, the 
British held possession of western posts belonging to the United States. These 
facts caused a prevalent belief that the British government yet hoped for an 
opportunity to bring the new Republic back to colonial dependence. The pub- 
lic mind in America became excited, and the fact, that Sir John Johnston* was 
the British Indian agent on that frontier, and Sir Guy Carleton (then Lord 
Dorchester) was again governor of Canada,' strengthened that opinion and 
apprehension. Finally, in the spring of 1790, the fostered discontents of the 
Indians were developed into open hostilities. Attempts at pacific arrangements 
were fruitless, and General Harmer was sent into the Indian country north of 
the present Cincinnati, with quite a strong force, to desolate their villages and 

' The Senate proposed the head of the President of the United States who should occupy the 
chair at the time of the coinage. In the House, the head of Liberty was suggested, as being less 
aristocratic than that of the President — having less the stamp of royalty. The head of Liberty was 
finally adopted, 

* The first mint was located in Philadelphia, and remained the sole issuer of coin, in the United 
States, until 1835, when a branch was established in each of the States of Georgia, North Carolina, 
and Louisiana — in Charlotte, Dahlonega, and New Orleans. These three branches went into oper- 
ation in the years 1837-38. 

^ From 1793 to 1795, inclusive, the value of the whole issue was less than half a million of 
dollars. Previous to the year 1830, almost the entire supply of gold for our coinage was fur- 
nished by foreign countries. North Carolina was the first State of the Union that sent gold to 
the Mint from its mines. Since then, almost every State has made contributions, some very 
small During the fiscal year ending in June, 1861, when the Civil War was kindling, the value 
of the entire issue of coin, by the Government Mint and its branches, was $84,000,000. The 
discovery of gold in California, in 1848, opened an immense treasury, and, up to the beginnmg 
of the war, tliat was the only great gold producing region within the Republic. Of the entire 
amount of gold, from domestic mines, deposited in the Mint up to 18G0, valued at $489,311,000, 
$409,406,003 was sent from CaUfornia. Adjacent territories are now [1867] yielding largely. 

* Page 459. The operations of the post-ofiSce department increased very rapidly year after 
year. In 1795, the number of post-office routes was 453; over 13,207 miles of travel. The 
revenue of the department was $160,620. TNTien the CivilWar began, in 1861, the number of 
routes was about 9,000 ; the number of miles traveled, full 260,000; and the revenue nearly 
$9,000,000. * Page 343. * Note 2, page 278. ' Page 240. 



874 'T'HE NATION". [1T8^ 

crops, as Sullivan did those of the Senecas in 1779.' In this he succeeded, but 
in two battles [Oct. 17 and 22, 1790], near the present village of Fort Wajne, 
in Indiana, he was defeated, with considerable loss. The following year, an 
expedition of Kentucky volunteers, under General Scott, marched against the 
Indians on the Wabash. General Wilkinson led a second expedition against 
them, in July following, and in September, General St. Clair,' then governor 
of the North-west Territory, marched into the Indian country, with two thou- 
sand men. While in camp near the northern line of Darke county, Ohio, on 
the borders of Indiana, he was surprised and defeated [I^ov. 4, 1791] by the 
Indians, with a loss of about nine hundred men, killed and wounded. 

The defeat of St. Clair produced great alarm on the whole north-western 
frontier. Even the people of Pittsburg' did not feel secure, and the border 
settlers called loudly for help. Fortunately the Indians did not follow up the 
advantage they had gained, and for a while hostilities ceased. Commissioners 
were appointed to treat with them, but through the interference of British 
officials, their negotiations were fruitless. General Wayne^ had been appointed, 
in the mean while, to succeed St. Clair in military command, and apprehend- 
ing that the failure of the negotiations would be followed by an immediate 
attack upon the frontier settlements, he marched into the Indian country in the 
autumn of 1793. He spent the winter at Greenville,^ near the place of St. 
Clair's defeat, where he built Fort Recovery. The following summer [1794] 
he pushed forward to the Maumee River, and built Fort Defiance f and on the 
St. Mary's he erected Fort Adams as an intermediate post. On the 16th of 
August he went down the Maumee, with three thousand men, and not far from 
the present Maumee City,'^ he fought and defeated the Indians, on the 20th of 
the same month. He then laid wa^te their country, and after a successful 
campaign of about ninety days, he went into winter quarters at Greenville. 
There, the following year, the chiefs and warriors of the western tribes, in all 
about eleven hundred, met [August 3, 1795] commissioners of the United 
States, made a treaty of peace, and ceded to the latter a large tract of land in 
the present States of Michigan* and Indiana. After that, the United States 
had very little trouble with the western Indians until just before the breaking 
out of the war of 1812-15.^ 

Party spirit, which had been engendered during the discussions of the 
Nati'onal Constitution," gradually assumed distinct forms, and during the second 
session of the second Congress, it became rampant among the people, as well as 
in the national legislature. Hamilton and Jefferson, the heads of distinct 
departments'^ in Washington's cabinet, differed materially concerning important 
public measures, and then, under the respective leadership of those statesmen, 

* Page 304. ^ Pacje 276. ' Page 205. * Page 298. ^ In Parke county, Ohio. 

^ At the junction of the Au Glaize with the Maumee River, in tlie south-east part of Williams 
county, Ohio. 

^ In the town of 'Waynesfield. The British then occupied a fort at the Maumee Rapids^ 
near by. 

° The British held possession of Detroit, and nearly aU Michigan, until 1796. See page 380. 

Page 409. »" Page 360. " Page 367. 




^>c-«^ 






Wayne's Defeat of the Indians. 



1197.] WASHINGTON'S ADMINISTRATION. 377 

were drawn those lines of party distinction known as Federalist and Repub- 
lican, which continued for a quarter of a centurj. The Federalist party was 
composed of those who favored great concentration of power in the general gov- 
ernment. The Republica)is, on the contrary, were for diflfusing power among 
the people. Here were antagonistic points of great difference, and the warfare 
between the parties was acrimonious in the extreme. 

During the summer of 1792, very little of public interest occurred, except 
the admission [June 1] of Kentucky' into the Union, but the marshalling of 
forces for the presidential election, which was to take place in the autumn. 
Washington yearned for the quiet of private life, and had expressed his deter- 
mination to withdraw from public station on the expiration of his presidential 
term ; but it was made evident to his mind, that the great majority of the 
people desired his continuance in office, and that the public safety demanded 
it. Under these circumstances, he consented to be a candidate, and he and 
Adams were re-elected by large majorities. 

Yet the Republican party was daily gaining strength, partly from develop- 
ments within the body pohtic of the United States, and partly from events then 
transpiring in Europe. A bloody revolution was in progress in France. The 
people there had abolished monarchy, and murdered their king, and the new 
Republic in name (a political chaos jn reality), having the avowed sympathies 
of the Republican party in America,'^ sent M. Genet' as its minister to the 
United States, to obtain the co-operation of the American people. The French 
Republic had declared war against England, Spain, and Holland, and needed 
transatlantic assistance. Remembering the recent alliance,* and sympathizing 
with all efforts for jwpular freedom, the Republican party here, and also many 
of the Federalists, received Genet (who arrived at Charleston, South Carolina, 
in April, 1793) with open arms, and espoused his cause. 

But Genet's zeal outstripped his prudence, and defeated his plans. With- 
out waiting for an expression of opinions or intentions from the government of 
the United States, he began to fit out privateers^ in our ports, to depredate 
upon English, Dutch, and Spanish property ;* and when Washington prudently 
issued [May 9, 1793] a proclamation, declaring it to be the duty and the inter- 

' Kentucky, which had been settled chiefly by Virginians, and was claimed as a part of the 
territory of that State, was now erected into a sovereign member of the confederation. Its first 
settlement, as we have seen [note 2, page 300], was at Boonesboro', by Daniel Boone, in 1775. 

* There was a general burst of enthusiasm in the United States, on receipt of the intelligence of 
the advent of Liberty in France, and public demonstrations of it were made in several places. In 
Boston, an ox, roasted whole, was placed upon a car drawn by sixteen horses, and with the Amer- 
ican and French flags displayed from its horns, was paraded through the streets, foUowed by carts, 
bearing bread and two hogsheads of punch, which were distributed among the people. A civic 
feast was held at Faneuil Hall, over which Samuel Adams [note 1, page 221] presided. In Pliil- 
adelphia the anniversary of the French alliance [page 283] was celebrated by a public dinner, at 
which General Mifflin [page 352] presided ; and in other places festivals were held. 

' Edmund Charles Genet was the son of a distinguished public man in France. He married, in 
this country, a daughter of Governor George Clinton [note 5. page 350], and remained in the 
United States. He died at Greenbush, opposite Albany, in 1834, aged about seventy-two years. 

* Page 283. _ a j^^^g ^ p^^g 946. 

* These cruisers brought captured vessels into our ports, and French consuls actually held 
courts of admiralty, and authorized the sale of the prizes. All this was done before Genet was 
recognized as a minister by the American government. 



878 THE NATION. 11789. 

est of the people of the United States to preserve a strict neutrality toward the 
contending powers of Europe, Genet persisted, and tried to excite hostility 
between our people and their government. Washington finally requested and 
obtained his recal, and Fauchet, who succeeded him in 1794, was instructed to 
assure the President that the French government disapproved of Genet's con- 
duct. No doubt the prudence and firmness of Washington, at this time, saved 
our Republic from utter ruin. 

A popular outbreak in western Pennsylvania, known in history as The 
Whiskey Insurrection^ gave the new government much trouble in 1794. An 
excise laAv, passed in 1791, which imposed duties on domestic distilled liquors, 
was very unpopular. A new act, passed in the spring of 1794, was equally 
unpopular ; and when, soon after the adjournment of Congress, officers were 
sent to enforce it in the western districts of Pennsylvania, they were resisted 
by the people, in arms. The insurrection became general throughout all that 
region, and in the vicinity of Pittsburg many outrages were committed. 
Buildings were burned, mails were robbed, and government ofiicers Avere in- 
sulted and abused. At one time there were between six and seven thousand 
insurgents under arms. The local militia would have been utterly impotent to 
restore order, if their aid had been given. Indeed, most of the militia assem- 
bled in response to a call made by the leaders of the insurgents, and these com- 
posed a large portion of the " rebels." The insurgent spirit extended into the 
border counties of Virginia ; and the President and his cabinet, perceiving, with 
alarm, this imitation of the lawlessness of French politics, took immediate steps 
to crush the growing hydra. The President first issued two proclamations 
[August 7, and September 25], but without efiect. After due consideration, 
and the exhaustion of all peaceable means, he ordered out a large body of the 
militia of Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, who marched to 
the insurgent district, in October [1794], under the command of General 
Henry Lee, tlien governor of Virginia.' This last argument Avas effectual ; and 
soon this insurrection, like that of Shays's, of Massachusetts, some years 
earlier,' which threatened the stability of the National Government, was 
allayed. 

Another cloud was now rising in the political horizon. While these inter- 
nal commotions were disturbing the public tranquillity, a bitter feelino- was 
growing up between the American and British governments. Each accused 
the other of infractions of the treaty of 1783," and the disputes, daily assuming 
a more bitter tone, threatened to involve the two nations in another Avar. The 
Americans complained that no indemnification had been made for negroes car- 
ried aAvay at the close of the ReA'olution ;* that the British held military posts 
on their frontiers, contrary to the treaty ;^ that British emissaries had excited 
the hostility of the Indians ;° and that, to retaliate on France, the English had 

' Page 333. "^ Page 353. » Page 348. 

* During the last two years of the war in the Carolinas and Georgia and at the final evacua- 
tion, the British plundered many plantations, and sold the negroes in the West Indies. 

' Note 8, page 374. ^ p g 373^. 



1797.] 



THE NATION. 



379 



captured our neutral vessels, and impressed our seamen into the British service.' 
The British complained that stipulations concerning the property of loyalists,' 
and also in relation to debts contracted in England before the Revolution, had 
not bean complied with. In order to avert an event so very undesirable as 
a war with Great Britain, the President proposed to send a special envoy to the 
British court, in hopes of bringing to an amicable settlement, all matters in 
dispute between the two governments. The National Legislature approved of it. 




and on the 19th of April, 1794, John Jay^ was appointed an envoy extraordi- 
nary for the purpose. 

The special minister of the United States was received with great courtesy 
in England, where he arrived in June ; and he negotiated a treaty which, at the 
time, was not very satisfactory to a large portion of his countrymen. It hon- 
estly provided for the collection of debts here, by British creditors, which had 



* This practice was one of the causes which finally produced a war between the two nations, 
in 1812. See page 409. 

' The lo_yalists, or Tories [note 4, page 226], who had fled from the country during the prog- 
ress, or at the close of the War for Independence, and whose property had been confiscated, 
endeavoured to regain their estates, and also indemnity for their other losses. The British govern- 
ment finally paid to these sufferers more than $15,000,000. 

' John Jay was a descendant of a Huguenot family [page 49], and was born in the city of New 
York in 1745. He was early in the ranks of active patriots, and rendered very important services 
during the Kevolution After the war he was one of the most efficient of our countrymen in laying 
the foundations of our National Government, and of establishing tlie civil government of hia 
native State, of which he was chief magistrate at one time. He retired from public life in 1801, 
and died in 1829, at the age of eighty-lour years. His residence was at Bedford, Westchester 
county, New York. 



38.0 (THE NATION. [1789. 

been contracted before the Revolution, but it procured no redress for those who 
!iad lost negroes. It secured indemnity for unlawful captures on the seas, and 
the evacuation of the forts on the frontiers (yet held by the British), by the 1st 
of June, IT96. In order to secure certain points of great importance. Jay was 




compelled to yield others ; and he finally signed a treaty, defective, in some 
things, and objectionable in others, but the best that could then be obtained. 
The treaty gave rise to violent debates in Congress,' and in State Legislatures, 
but was ratified by the Senate on the 24th of June, 1795.* The wisdom, 

' The debates, on that occasion, developed talent of the highest order, and present a memorable 
epoch in the history of American politics and statesmanship. Albert Gallatin then established 
his title to the leadership of the opposition in the House of Representatives, while Fisher Ames, in a 
speech of wonderful power, in favor of the treaty and the Administration, won for himself the 
laurels of an unrivaled orator. He was then in feeble health ; and when he arose to speak, thin 
and pale, ho could hardly support himself on his feet, and his voice was feeble. Strength seemed 
to come as he warmed with the subject, and his eloquence and wisdom poured forth as from a 
mighty and inexhaustible fountain. So powerful was his speech, that a member opposed to him 
moved that the question on which he had spoken should be postponed until the next day, " that 
they should not act under the influence of an excitement of which their calm judgment might not 
approve." In allusion to this speech, John Adams bluntly said: "There wasn't a dry eye in the 
House, except some of the jackasses that occasioned the necessity of the oratory." Fisher Ames 
was born in Dedham, Massachusetts, in April, 1756. His health was delicate from infency. He 
was so precocious that he commenced the study of Latin when six years of age, and was admitted 
to Harvard College at the age of twelve. He chose the law for a profession, and soon stood at the 
head of the bar in his native district. He was a warm advocate of the Federal Constitution. He 
was the first representative of his district in the National Congress. He died on the 4tli of 
July, 1808, at the age of forty-eight years. 

^ Great excitement succeeded. In several cities mobs threatened personal violence to the sup 



1797.] WASHINGTON'S ADMINISTRATION. 381 

and policy, and true patriotism of Mr. Jay were soon made manifest. In Oc- 
tober following, a treaty was concluded with Spain, by which the boundaries be- 
tween the Spanish territories of Louisiana and Florida, and the United States, 
were defined. That treaty also secured to the United States the free naviga- 
tion of the Mississippi, and the use of New Orleans, as a port, for ten years. 

As soon as one excitement was fairly allayed, causes for others appeared ; 
and during the whole time of Washington's administration of eight years, when 
the policy of the new government had to be established, and its machinery put 
in operation, the greatest wisdom, circumspection, and conservative action, on 
the part of officials, were continually demanded. Difficulties appeared like 
little clouds on the distant horizon, sometimes as mere specks, at others, in 
alarming shapes. These were chiefly in connection with trade, especially in 
foreign lands. American commerce was rapidly expanding, and now began to 
find its way into the Mediterranean Sea. There it was met by Algerine 
pirates, who seized the merchandise, and held the seamen in captivity, in order 
to procure ransom-money. These depredations, v^hich finally gave rise to efforts 
to organize a navy, had continued many years before the government took 
active measures to suppress them. President Washington called the attention 
of Congress to the subject, toward the close of 1790 ; and at the same time, 
Jefferson, then Secretary of State, gave many interesting details, in his annual 
report, on the subject of these piracies. A commissioner was sent to treat with 
the Dey, or Governor, of Algiers on the subject, but that semi-barbarian robber 
argued in reply : " If I were to make peace with everybody, what should I do 
with my corsairs ? what should I do with my soldiers ? They would take off 
my head for the want of other prizes, not being able to live on their miserable 
allowance." 

In the spring of 1794, Congress, on account of these depredations, passed 
an Act to provide for a naval armament, and appropriated almost seven hun- 
dred thousand dollars for the purpose. But the United States, in the absence 
of the proposed navy, was compelled to make a treaty of peace in the autumn 
of 1795 [November 28], with the Dey of Algiers, by which an annual 
tribute was to be given for the redemption of captives, in accordance with the 
long-established usages of European nations.* This was humiliating, but could 
not then be avoided. Congress had given the President power to provide by 
purchase or otherwise, and equip, several vessels. To this end he put forth 
his energies immediately, and in July [1794], he commissioned captains and 
superintendents, naval constructors and navy agents, six each, and ordered the 
construction of six ships. The treaty with the Dey of Algiers caused work on 

porters of the treaty. Mr Jay was burned in effigy [note 6, page 215], Mr. Hamilton was stoned 
at a public meeting, and the British minister at Philadelphia was insulted. 

' Between the years 1785 and 1793, the Algerine pirates captured and carried into Algiers, 
fifteen American vessels, used the property, and made one hundred and eighty officers and seamen 
slaves of the most revolting kind. In 1795, the United States agreed, by treaty, to pay eight hun- 
dred thousand dollars for captives, then alive, and in addition, to make the dey, or governor, a 
present of a fi-igate worth a hundred thousand dollars. An annual tribute of twenty -three thousand 
dollars was also to bo paid. Tliis was complied with until the breaking out of the war of 1812. 
See pages 390 and 445. 



382 THE NATION. [1789. 

these vessels to be suspended in 1795. Soon the folly of not completing the 
little navy, so well begun, was made manifest, when British cruisers commenced 
the practice of taking seamen from American vessels, and impressing them into 
the English service.' The ships of the French Republic soon afterward com- 
menced depredations upon American commerce ; and in 1797, when war with 
that government seemed inevitable," Congress, on the urgent recommendation 
of President Adams, caused the frigates United States, Constellation, and 
Constitution to be completed, equipped, and sent to sea. This was the com- 
mencement of the American navy,' which, in after years, though weak in num- 
bers, performed many brilliant exploits. From this time the navy became the 
cherished arm of the national defense ; and chiefly through its instrumentality, 
the name and power of the United States began to be properly appreciated in 
Europe, at the beginning of the present century. 

Now [1796], the administration of Washington was drawing to a close. It 
had been one of vast importance and incessant action. All disputes with 
foreign nations, except France,^ had been adjusted; government credit was 
established, and the nation was highly prosperous.^ The embryos of new em- 
pires beyond the Alleghanies, had been planted ; and the last year of his admin- 
istration was signalized by the admission [June, 1796] of Tennessee into the 
Union of States, making the number of confederated republics, sixteen. 

During the closing months of Washington's administration, the first great 
struggle among the people of the United States, for ascendancy between the 
Federalists and RejAfblicans," took place. The only man on whom the nation 
now could possibly unite, was about to retire to private life. He issued his 
admirable Farewell Address to his countrymen — that address so full of wis- 
dom, patriotism, and instruction — early in the autumn of 1796 [September 19], 
and then the people were fully assured that some other man must be chosen to 
fill his place. There was very little time for preparation or electioneering, for 
the choice must be made in November following. Activity the most extraordi- 
nary appeared among politicians, in every part of the Union. The Federalists 
nominated John Adams for the high ofiice of Chief Magistrate, and the Repub- 
licans nominated Thomas JeiFerson for the same. The contest was fierce, and 
party spirit, then in its youthful vigor, was implacable. The result was a vic- 

> Page 401. "" Page 385. 

^ Congress had created the office of Secretary of the Navy, as an executive department, and on 
the 30th of April, 1798, Benjamin Stodort of Georgetown, in the District of Cohimbia, waa 
appointed to tliat chair. Hitherto the business of tlie war and navy departments had been per- 
formed by the Secretary of War. 

* Tlie French government was highly displeased because of the treaty made with England, by Mr. 
Jay, and even adopted hostile measures toward the United States. It wanted the Americans to 
show an active participation \\\i\\ the French in hatred of the English, and therefore the strict neu- 
trality observed by Washington, was exceedingly displeasing to the French Committee of Public 
Safety. The conclusion of the treaty with Algiers, independently of French intervention, and the 
success of the negotiation with Spain, excited the jealousy of the French rulers. In a word, 
because the United States, having the strength, assumed the right to stand alone, the French were 
offended, and threatened the grown-up child with personal chastisement. 

^ Commerce had wonderfully expanded. The exports had, in five years, increased from nine- 
teen millions of dollars to mere than fifty-six millions of dollars, and the imports in about the same 
ratio. ° Page 377. 



1801.] 



ADAMS'S ADMINISTRATION. 



383 



tory for both parties — Adams being elected President, and Jefferson, having 
the ne.xt highest number of votes, was chosen Vice-President.' On the 4th of 
March, 1797, Washington retired from office, and Adams was inaugurated the 
second President of the United States. The great leader of the armies in the 
War for Independence was never again enticed from the quiet pursuits of agri- 
culture at Mount Vernon, to the performance of public duties. 



CHAPTER II. 

ADAMS'S ADMINISTRATION. [17 9 7 — 1801.] 

John Adams'* was in the sixtj-second year of his age when, dressed in a 
full suit of pearl-colored broadcloth, and with powdered hair, he stood in Inde- 
pendence Hall [March 4, 1797], in Philadelphia, and took the oath of office. 




ifdn^ydmiJ 



' The whole number of electoral votes [see note 1, page 361] was one hundred and thirty-eight, 
making seventy necessary to a choice. John Adams received seventy-one, and Jefferson sixty-seven. 

" John Adams was born at Braintree, Massachusetts, in October, 1735. He chose the law as a 
profession, but being a good writer and fair speaker, he entered the political field quite early, and 
with Hancock, Otis, and others, he took an active part in the earlier Revolutionary movemrats, in 
Boston and vicinity. He was a member of the Continental Congress, from which he was trans- 
ferred to the important post of a minister to the French and other courts in Europe. He was one 
of the most industriDus men in Congress. In the course of the eighteen months preceding his de- 



384 



THE NATION. 



[1797. 



as President of the United States, administered by Chief Justice Ellsworth.' 
He was pledged, bj his acts and declarations, to the general policy of Washing- 
ton's administration, and he adopted, as his own, the cabinet council left by his 
predecessor." He came into office at a period of great trial for the Republic. 
Party spirit and sectional differences were rife in its bosom, and the relations 
t/f the United States with France were becoming more and more unfriendly. 




Already Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, the American minister at the French 
court, had been ordered to leave their territory by the Directory, then the su- 
preme executive power in France.^ Depredations upon American commerce 
had also been authorized by theni ; and the French minister in the United 



parture for Europe, Mr. Adams had been on ninety different committees, and was chairman of 
thirty-five of them. He was, at one time, intrusted with no less than six missions abroad, namely, 
to treat for peace with Great Britain; to make a commercial treaty with Great Britain; to negoti- 
ate the same with the States General of Holland ; the same with the Prince of Orange; to pledge 
the faith of the United States to the Armed Neutrality ; and to negotiate a loan of ten miUions of 
dollars. He was a signer of the Declaration of Independence ; and died on the fiftieth anniversary 
of that great act [1826], with the words "Independence forever!"' upon his lips. He was in the 
ninety-second year of his age. See page 459. * Page 360. 

"^ Timothy Pickering, Secretary of State; Oliver "Wolcott, Secretary of the Treasury; Jamea 
M'Henry, Secretary of War; and Charles Lee, Attorney-General. Washington's first cabinet had 
all resigned during the early part of his second term of office (the President is elected for four years), 
and the above-named gentlemen were appointed during 1795 and 1796. 

* The Republican government of France was administered by a council called the Directory. It 
was composed of five members, who ruled in connection with two representative bodies, called, re- 
spectively, the Council of Ancients, and the Council of Five Hundred. The Directory was the bead, 
or executive power of the government. 



1801.] ADAMS'S ADMINISTRATION. 385 

States had grossly insulted the government. President Adams perceived the 
necessity of prompt and energetic action, and he convened an extraordinary 
session of Congress, on the 15th of May. With the concurrence of the Senate, 
the President appointed [July] three envoys.' with Pinckney at their head, to 
proceed to France, and endeavor to adjust all difficulties. They met at Paris, 
in October, but were refused an audience with the Directory, unless they 
should first pay a large sum of money into the French treasury. Overtures 
for this purpose were made by unofficial agents The demand was indignantly 
refused; and then it was that Pinckney uttered that noble sentiment, "Mil- 
lions for defense, but not' one cent for tribute !" The two Federalist envoys 
(Marshall and Pinckney) were ordered out of the country, while Mr. Gerry, 
who was a Republican, and whose party sympathized with the measures of 
France, was allowed to remain. The indignant people of the United States 
censured Mr. Gerry severely for remaining. He, too, soon found that nothing 
could be accomplished with the French rulers, and he returned home. 

The fifth Congress assembled at Philadelphia, on the 13th of November, 
1797. Perceiving the vanity of further attempts at negotiation with France, 
Congress, and the country generally, began to prepare for war. Quite a large 
standing army was authorized [May, 1798] ; and as Washington approved of the 
measure, he was appointed [July] its commander-in-chief, with General Alex- 
ander Hamilton as his first lieutenant. Washington consented to accept the 
office only on condition that General Hamilton should be the acting commander- 
in-chief, for the retired President was unwilling to enter into active military serv- 
ice again. A*naval armament, and the capture of French vessels of war, was 
authorized; and a naval department, as we have observed,^ with Benjamin 
Stodert at its head, was created. Although there was no actual declaratioj 
of war made by either party, yet hostilities were commenced on the ocean, and a 
vessel of each nation suffered capture f but the army was not summoned to the 
field. 

The proud tone of the French Directory was humbled by the dignified and 
decided measures adopted by the United States, and that body made overtures 
for a peaceful adjustment of difficulties. President Adams immediately ap- 
pointed [Feb. 26, 1799] three envoys* to proceed to France, and negotiate for 



' Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, Elbridge Gerry, and John Marshall Pinckney was an actire 
patriot in South Carolina during the Revolution. He was bom in Charleston, in February, 1746, 
and was eduated in England. He studied law there, and on his return to his native country, in 
1769, he commenced a successful professional career in Charleston. He took part early in Repub- 
hcan movements, held military offices during the War for Independence, and when war with Franc© 
seemed certain, in 1797, Washington appointed him next to Hamilton in command He died, in 
August, 1825, in the eightieth year of his age. Gerry was one of the signers of the Declaration of 
Independence, and Marshall had been an active patriot and soldier. See page 351. The latter, 
as Chief Justice of the United States, administered the oath of office to several Presidents. 

* Page 382. 

* The United States firigate Oonstellaiion, captured the French frigate L'lnsurgenie, in February, 
1 • 99. That frigate had already taken the American schooner Retaliation. On the 1st of Febnuuy, 
1800. the Constellation had an action with the French frigate La Vengeance, which escaped cap- 
ture after a loss of one hundred and sixty men, in killed and wounded. 

■* "\V. V. Murray, Oliver Ellsworth, and Patrick Henry. Mr. Henry declined, and "William R 
Davie [note 5, page ^SIB], of Xorth Carolina, took his place. 

25 



386 * T H E NATION. [1797. 

peace, but when thej arrived, the weak Directory was no more. The govern- 
ment was in the hands of Napoleon Bonaparte [Nov. 1799] as First Consul,' 
whose audacitj and energy now saved France from anarchy and utter ruin. He 
promptly received the United States embassadors, concluded a treaty [Sept. 30, 
1800], and gave such assurances of friendly feelings that, on the return of the 
ministers, the provisional army of the United States, whose illustrious com- 
mander-in-chief had, in the mean while, been removed by death, was disbanded. 

Two unpopular domestic measures were adopted in the summer of 1798, 
known as the Aliefi and Sedition laws. The first authorized the President to 
expel from the country any alien (not a citizen) who should be suspected of 
conspiring against the Republic. An apology for the law was, that it was com- 
puted that there were more than thirty thousand Frenchmen in the United 
States, all of whom were devoted to their native country, and were mostly asso- 
ciated, by clubs or otherwise. Besides these, there were computed to be in the 
country at least fifty thousand persons who had been subjects of Great Britain, 
some of whom had found it unsafe to remain at home. The Sedition law author- 
izef^. the suppression of publications calculated to weaken the authority of the 
government. At that period there were two hundred newspapers published in the 
United States, of which about one hundred and seventy-five were in favor of the 
National administration ; the remainder Avere chiefly under the control of aliens. 
These measures were unpopular, because they might lead to great abuses. In 
Kentucky and Virginia, the legislatures declared them to be decidedly uncon, 
i^titutional, and they were finally repealed. 

The nation suffered a sad bereavement near the close of the last year of the 
century. Washington, the greatest and best-beloved of its military and civil 
leaders, died at Mount Vernon on the 14th of December, 1799, when almost 
sixty-eight years of age. No event since the foundation of the government, 
had made such an impression on the public mind. The national grief was 
sincere, and party spirit was hushed into silence at his grave. All hearts 
united in homage to the memory of him who was properly regarded as the 
Father of his Country. Congress was then in session at Philadelphia, and 
when Judge Marshall" announced the sad event, both Houses^ immediately 
adjourned for the day. On re-assembling the next day, appropriate resolutions 
were passed, and the President was directed to write a letter of condolence to 
Mrs. Washington,* in the name of Congress. Impressive funeral ceremonies were 

* Bonaparte, Cambaceres, and the Abbe Sieyes became the ruling power in France, with the 
title of Consuls, after the first had overthrown the Directorj^ Bonaparte was the First Consul, and 
was, in fact, an autocrat, or one who rules by his own will. " Page 351. ^ Note 3, page 366. 

* Martha Dandridge, who first married Daniel Parke Custis, and afterward, while yet a young 
■widow, was wedded to Colonel Washington, was born in Kent county, Virginia, in 1732, about 
three months later than her illustrious husband. Her first husband died when she was about 
twenty-five years of age, leaving her with two children, and a large fortune in lands dnd money. 
She was married to Colonel Washington, in January, 1759. She was ever worthy of such a hus- 
band; and while he was President of the United States, she presided with dignity over the execu- 
tive mansion, both in New York and Philadelphia. ■ When her husband died, she said : " 'Tis well , 
all is now over ; I shall soon follow him ; I have no more trials to pass through." In httle less 
than thirty months afterward, she was laid in the family vault at Mount Vernon. Her grandson, 
;in(l adopted son of Washington (also the last surviving executor of his will), G. W. P. Custis, 
dijd at Arlington House, opposite Washington City, October 10, 1857. 



1801.] 



ADAMS'S ADMINISTRATION. 



38T 



observed by that body, and throughout the country.' General Henry Lee,' of 
Virginia, on the invitation of Congress, delivered [December 26, 1799] an 
eloquent funeral oration before the national legislature ; and the recommenda- 
tion of Congress, for the people of the United States to wear crape on their left 
arms for thirty days, was generally complied with. The whole nation put on 
.tokens of mourning. 




o^ h(^^/^^ 



The death of Washington also made a profound impression in Europe. To 
the people there, who were aspiring for freedom, it seemed as if a bright star 
had disappeared from the firmament of their hopes. Rulers, also, joined in 
demonstrations of respect. Soon after the event of his death was known in 
France, Bonaparte, then First Consul,' rendered unusual honors to his name. 
On the 9th of February [1800], he issued the following order of the day to 
the army : " Washington is dead ! This great man fought against tyrar/iy ; he 
established the liberties of his country. His memory will always be dear to 
the French people, as it will be to all free men of the two worlds ; and especially 
to French soldiers, who, like him and the American soldiers, have combatted 
for liberty and equality." Bonaparte also ordered, that during ten days black 
crape should be suspended from all the standards and flags throughout the 
French Republic. Splendid ceremonies in the Champs de Mars, and a 
funeral oration in the Hotel des Invalides, were also given, at both ol' which 



' Oon^esa resolved to erect a mausoleum, or monument, at Washington City, to his memory, 
marble, is now [1883] in course of erection there, U> be paid lor largely by individual sul:- 
rcriptions. Congress has made a liberal appropriation lor completing^ the monument. 

- Note 2, page 833. 



Note 1, page 395. 



388 THE NATION. [1801. 

the First Consul, and all the civil and military authorities of the capital were 
present. Lord Bridport, commander of a British fleet of almost sixty vessels, 
lying at Torbay, on the coast of France, Avlien he heard of the death of Wash- 
ington, lowered his flag half-mast, and this example was followed by the whole 
fleet. And from that time until the present, the name of Washington has 
inspired increasing reverence at home and abroad, until now it may be said that 
the praise of him fills the whole earth. 

After the close of the difiiculties with France, very little of general interest 
occurred during the remainder of Mr. Adams's administration, except the 
removal of the seat of the National Government to the District of Columbia,' in 
the summer of 1800 ; the admission into the Union [May, 1800] of the country 
between the western frontier of Georgia and the Mississippi River, as the Mis- 
sissippi Territory ; and the election of a new President of the United States. 
Now, again, came a severe struggle between the Federalists and Republic- 
ans, for political power.'' The former nominated Mr. Adams and Charles 
Cotesworth Pinckney,^ for President ; the latter nominated Thomas Jefferson 
and Aaron Burr,* for the same ofiice. In consequence of dissensions among the 
Federalist leaders, and the rapid development of ultra-democratic ideas among 
the people, the Republican party was successful. Jefferson and Burr had an 
equal number of electoral votes. The task of choosing, therefore, was trans- 
ferred to the House of Representatives, according to the provisions of the 
National Constitution. The choice finally fell upon Mr. Jefferson, after thirty- 
five ballotings ; and Mr. Burr was proclaimed Vice-President. 

During the year 1800, the hist of Adams's administration, the second enu- 
meration of the inhabitants of the United States took place. The population 
•was then five millions, three hundred and nineteen thousand, seven hundred and 
sixty-two — an increase of one million, four hundred thousand in ten years. 
The National revenue, which amounted to four millions, seven hundred and 
seventy-one thousand dollars in 1790, was increased to almost thirteen millions 
in 1800. 



CHAPTER III. 

JEFFERSON'S ADMINISTRATION. [1301 — 1809]. 

Thomas Jefferson,* the third President of the United States, was in the- 
fifty-eighth year of his age when, on the 4th of March, 1801, he was duly 

' Page 371. The District is a tract ten miles square on each side of the Potomac, ceded to the 
United States by Maryland and Virginia in 1790. The city of Washington was \n\d out there in ] 791, 
and the erection of the Capitol was commenced in 1793, when [April 18] President Washington laid 
the comer stone of the north wing, with Masonic honors. The two wings were completed in 1808, 
and these were burned by the British in 1814. See page 436. The central portion of the Capitol- 
•was completed in 1827, the wings having been repaired soon after the conflagration. Altogether 
it covered an area of a httle more than an acre and a half of ground. In course of time it became ■ 
too small, and its dimensions wore greatly extended. These were completed in 1865. The addition 
is in the form of wings, north and south, projecting both east and west beyond the main building. 

a Page 377. = Note 1, page 385. ■• Note 4, page 241, and page 397. 

* Thomas Jofiferson was bom in Alberaarle county, Virginia, in April, 1743. He was educated 



1809.J 



JEFFERSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



389 



inaugurated the Chief Magistrate of the Republic, in the new Capitol, at Wash- 
ington City. His inaugural speech, which was looked for with great anxiety, 
as a foreshadowing of the policy of the new President, was manly and conserv- 
ative, and it allayed many apprehensions of his opponents. From its tone, they 




imagined that few of the National office-holders would be disturbed ; but in this 
they soon found themselves mistaken. The Federal party, while in power, 
having generally excluded Republicans from office, Jefferson felt himself justi- 
fied in giving places to his own political friends. He therefore made many 
removals from official station throughout the country ; and then was commenced 
the second act in the system of political proscription,' which has not always 
proved wise or salutary. He retained, for a short time, Mr. Adams's Secretaries 
of the Treasury and Navy (Samuel Dexter and Benjamin Stoddart), but called 



at William and Mary College, studied law with the eminent George "Wythe, and had his patriotism 
first inflamed by hstening to Patrick Henrv's famous speech [note 1, page 214] against the Stamp Act. 
He first appeared in public life in the Virginia Assembly, in 1769, and was one of the most active 
workers in that body, until sent to perform more important duties in the Continental Congress. 
The inscription upon his monument, written by himself, tells of the most important of his public 
labors : " Here hes buried Thomas Jeffersox, Author of the Declaration of Independence ; of the 
Statute of Virginia for religious freedom ; and Father of the University of Virginia." He v.ras 
governor of his own State, and a foreign minister. He lived until the fiftieth anniversary of the 
Declaration of Independence [July 4, 1826], and at almost the same hour when the spirit of Adanui 
took its flight [page 457], his also departed from the body, when he was at the age of eightj- 
three yeara * Pa^je 461. 



390 THli NATION. [1801. 

Republicans to fill the other seats in his cabinet.' He set vigorously at work 
to reform public abuses, as far as was in his power ; and so conciliatory were 
his expressed views in reference to the great body of his opponents, that many 
Federalists joined the Republican ranks, and became bitter denouncers of their 
former associates and their principles. 

President Jefferson's administration was signalized at the beginning by the 
repeal of the Excise Act," and other obnoxious and unpopular laws. His sug- 
gestions concerning the reduction of the diplomatic corps, hauling up of the 
navy in ordinary, the abolition of certain offices, and the revision of the 
judiciary, were all taken into consideration by Congress, and many advances- 
in jurisprudence were made. Vigor and enlightened views marked his course ; 
and even his political opponents confessed his forecast and wisdom, in many 
things. During his first term, one State and two Territories were added to the 
confederacy. A part of the North-western Territory^ became a State, under 
the name of Ohio,* in the autumn of 1802 ; and in the spring of 1803, Louisi- 
ana was purchased [April] of France for fifteen millions of dollars. This 
result was brought about without much difficulty, for the French ruler was 
desirous of injuring England, and saw in this an excellent way to do it. In 
violation of a treaty made in the year 1795, the Spanish governor of Louisiana 
closed the port of New Orleans in 1802. Great excitement prevailed through- 
out the western settlements ; and a proposition was made in Congress to take 
forcible possession of the Territory. It was ascertained that, by a secret treaty, 
the country had been ceded to France, by Spain. Negotiations for its purchase 
were immediately opened with Napoleon, and the bargain was consummated in 
April, 1803. The United States took peaceable possession in the autumn of 
that year. It contained about eighty-five thousand mixed inhabitants, and 
about forty thousand negro slaves. When this bargain was consummated, 
Napoleon said, prophetically, "This accession of territory strengthens forever 
the power of the United States ; and I have just given to England a maritime 
rival that will sooner or later humble her pride." Out of it two Territories 
were formed, called respectively the Territory of New Orleans and the Dis- 
trict of Louisiana. 

We have already adverted to the depredations of Algerine corsairs upon 
American commerce. The insolence of the piratical powers on the southern 
chores of the Mediterranean,^ at length became unendurable; and the United 
States government resolved to cease paying tribute to them. The Bashaw of 
Tripoli thereupon declared war [June 10, 1801] against the United States ; 
and Captain Bainbridge was ordered to cruise in the Mediterranean to protect 

' James Madison, Secretary of State ; Henry Dearborn, Secretary of "War ; Levi Lincoln, Attor- 
ney General. Before the meeting of Congress in December, ho appointed Albert Gallatin [note 1, 
page 380, and note 6, page 443], Secretary of the Treasury, and Robert Smith, Secretary of the Navy. 
They were both Republicans. " Page 378. ' Page 362. 

* No section of the Union had increased, in population and resources, so rapidly as Ohio. When, 
in 1800, it was formed into a distinct Territory, the residue of the North-western Territory remained 
as one until 1809/ Then tlie Territories of Indiana and Illinois were formed. Wlien Ohio was- 
admitted as a State, it contained a population of about seventy-two thousand souls. 

* Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli, in Africa. They are known as the Barbary Powers. 



1809.] 



JEFFERSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



391 



American commerce.' In 1803, Commodore Preble was sent thither to humble 
the pirates. After bringing the Emperor of Morocco to terms, he appeared 
before Tripoli with his squadron. One of his vessels (the Philadelphia), com- 
manded by Bainbridge,"^ struck on a rock in the harbor, while rec«nnoitering ; 




and before she could be extricated, she was captured [October 31, 1803] hj 
the Tripolitans. The officers were treated as prisoners of war, but the crew 
were made slaves. 



' Captain Baiabridge had been on that coast the previous year. 
He arrived at Algiers in September, 1800, in the frigate Georye Washing- 
ton, with tlie annual tribute money [page 381]. The dey, or governor, 
demanded the use of his vessel to carry an ambassador to Constan- 
tinople. Bainbridgo remonstrated, when the dey hauglitily observed : 
" You pay me tribute, by which you become my slaves, and therefore 
I have a right to order you as I think proper" Bainbridge was 
obliged to comply, for the castle guns would not allow him to pass out 
of the harbor. He sailed for the East, and had the honor of flrst dis- 
playing the American flag liefore the ancient city of Constantinople. 
The Sultan regard^ it as a favorable omen of future friendship, because 
Aisflaa: bore a cre.sce.ni or half-moon, and the American a group o^ stars. 

' William Bainbridge was born in New Jersey, in 1774. He was captain of a merchant vessel 
at the age of nineteen years, and entered the naval service in 1798. He was distinguished during 
the second War for Independence [page 409], and died in 1833. 




•UNITED STATES FRIGATE. 



392 



T H E X A T I N. 



[180L 




IP 



\ 



LIEUTENANT DECATUR. 



The credit of the American navj was somewhat repaired, early in the 
following year, when Lieutenant Decatur, ' with only sev- 
enty-six volunteers, sailed into the harbor of Tripoli, in 
the evening of February 16, 180-1-, and runing alongside 
the Philadelphia (which lay moored near the castle, and 
guarded by a large number of Tripolitans), boarded her, 
killed or drove into the sea all of her turbaned defenders, 
set her on fire, and under cover of a heavy cannonade 
from the American squadron, escaped, without losing a 
man.'* As they left the burning vessel, the Americans 
raised a shout, which was answered by the guns of the 
batteries on the shore, and by the armed vessels at anchor 
near. They went out into the ]\Iediterranean unharmed, sailed for Syracuse, 
and were received there with great joy by the American squadron, under Com- 
modore Preble. This bold act humbled and alarmed the bashaw;^ yet his 
capital withstood a heavy bombardment, and his gun-boats gallantly sustained a 
severe action [August 3] with the American vessels. 

In the following year, through the aid of Hamet Caramelli, brother of Jes- 
suff, the reigning bashaw (or governor) of Tripoli, favorable terms of peace 
were secured. The bashaw was a usurper, and Hamet, the rightful heir to the 
throne,* was an exile in Egypt. He readily concerted, Avith 
Captain William Eaton, American consul at Tunis, a plan 
for humbling the bashaw, and obtaining his own restoration to 
rightful authority. Captain Eaton acted under the sanction of 
his government ; and early in March [March 6, 1805], he left 
Alexandria, with seventy United States seamen, accompanied 
by Hamet and his followers, and a few Egyptian troops. They 
made a journey of a thousand miles partly across tlie Barcan 
desert, and on the 27th of April, captured Derne, a Tripolitan 
city on the Mediterranean. Three w^eeks later [May 18], they 
had a successful battle with Tripolitan t roops ; and on the 1 8th 
of June they again defeated the forces of the bashaw, and 




MOHAMMEDAN 
SOLDIER. 



^ Stephen Decatur was born in Maryland in 1779. He entered the navy at the age of nineteen 
years. After his last cruise in the Mediterranean, he superintended the building of the gun-boats. 
He rose to the rank of commodore ; and during the second War for Independence [page 409], he 
was distinguished for his skill and bravery. He afterward humbled the Barbary Powers [note 5, 
page 390] ; and was esteemed as one among the choicest flowers of the navy. He was killed, at 
Bladensburg, in a duel with Commodore Barron, in March, 1820, when forty-one years of age. 

* While the American squadron was on its way to Syracuse, it captured a smaU Tripolitan ves- 
sel, bound to Constantinople, with a present of female slaves for the Sultan. This was taken into 
service, and named the Intrepid, and was the vessel with which Decatur performed his bold exploit 
at Tripoli. This act greatly enraged the Tripolitans, and the American prisoners were treated with 
the utmost severity. The annals of that day give some terrible pictures of white slavery on the 
southern shores of the ^Mediterranean Sea. 

' Bashaw, or Pacha [Pas-shaw], is the title of the governor of a province, or town, in the do- 
minions of the Sultan (or emperor) of Turkey. The Barbary States [note 5, page 390] are all under 
the Sultan's rule. 

* The bashaw, who wa.s a third son, had murdered his father and elder brother, and compelled 
Hamet to fly for his life. With quite a large number of followers, he fled into Egypt. 



*}\ I I 




Decatur Burning lui^ riiiLADELPiuA. 



1809.] 



JEFFERSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



395 



pressed forward toward Tripoli. The terrified ruler had made terms of peace 
[June 4, 1805J with Colonel Tobias Lear, American consul-general' in the 
Mediterranean, and thus disappointed the laudable ambition of Eaton, and the 
hopes of Hamet.'' 

While these hostile movements were occurring in the East; the President 




li»d, in a confidential message to Congress, in January, 1803, proposed the first 
of those peaceable conquests which have opened, and are still opening, to civil- 
ization and human industry, the vast inland regions of our continent. He rec- 
ommended an appropriation for defraying the expenses of an exploring expedi- 
tion across the continent from the Mississippi to the Pacific Ocean. The 
appropriation was made, and presently an expedition, consisting of thirty indi- 
viduals, under Captains Lewis and Clarke, was organized. They left the banka 
of the Mississippi on the 14th of May, 1804, and Avere absent about twenty-seven 
months. It was very successful, particularly in geographical discoveries, and 

' A consul is an officer appointed by a government to reside in a foreign port, to have a general 
supervision of the commercial interests of his country there. In some cases they have powers nlmost 
equal to a minister. Such is tlie case with consuls witliin the ports of Mohammedan countries. The 
word coyisul was applied to Napoleon [page 387] in the ancient Roman sense. It was the title of 
the chief magistrate of Rome during the Republic. The treaty made by Lear provided for an ex- 
change of prisoners, man for man, as far as tliey would go. Jessuff had about two hundred more 
prisoners than the Americans held, and for these! a ransom of $60,000 was to be paid. It was also 
stipulated that the wife and children of Hamet should be given up to him. 

' Hamet afterward came to the United States, and applied to Congress for a remuneration for 
his services in favor of the Americans. He was unsuccessfiil ; but Congress voted $2,400 for big 
temporary reUeC 



396 THIS NATION. [1801. 

furnished the first reliable information respecting the extensive country between 
the Mississippi and the Pacific Ocean. During the same year, the election for 
President of the United States recurred. Aaron Burr, having lost the confi- 
dence of the Democratic party,' was not re-nominated for Vice-President. 
George Clinton^ was put in his place ; and Jefierson and Clinton were elected 
by a great majority^ over their Federal opponents, Charles Cotesworth Pinck- 
ney,'' of South Carolina, who was nominated for President, and Rufus King,^ 
of New York, for Vice-President. 

A serious difficulty commenced in the West during the second year [1805] 
of Mr. Jefferson's second administration. The fertile valleys of the Ohio and 
Mississippi were then very rapidly filling with adventurers, and the materials 
for new States, strong and ample, were gathering. Michigan was erected into 
a Territory in 1805 ; and all along the Mississippi, extensive settlements were 
taking root and flourishing. The tide of population was full and unceasing, and 
was composed, chiefly, of adventurous characters, ready for any enterprise that 
should offer the result of great gain. Taking advantage of the restless spirit 
of these adventurers, and the general impression that the Spanish population of 
Louisiana would not quietly submit to the jurisdiction of the United States,^ 
Aaron Burr'' thought to make them subservient to his own ambitious purposes. 
His murder of Hamilton in a duel,*' on the 12th of July, 1804, made him 
everywhere detested ; and, perceiving his unpopularity in the fact of his having 
been superseded in the office of Vice-President of the United States, by George 
Clinton," he sought a new field for achieving personal aggrandisement. In 
April, 1805, he departed for the West, with several nominal objects in view, 
but chiefly in relation to pecuniary speculations. These seemed to conceal his 
real design of effecting a strong military organization, for the purpose of invad- 
ing the Spanish possessions in Mexico. General Wilkinson,'" then in the West, 
and the commaiider-in-ehief of the National army, became his associate. Wil- 

' Page 377. "^ Page 350. 

' The great popularity of Jefferson's administration was shown by the result of this election. He 
received in the electoral college [note 1, page 361] one hundred and sixty-two votes, and Mr. 
Pinckney only fourteen. * Page 384. 

^ Rufiis King was bom in 1755, and was in Harvard College in 1775, when hostihties with 
Great Britain commenced, and the students were dispersed. He chose the law for a profession, and 
became very eminent as a practitioner. He was in Sulhvan's army, on Rhode Island [page 289], 
in 1778 ; and in 1784, the people, appreciatmg his talents and his oratorical powers, elected liim to a 
seat in the Legislature of Massachusetts. He was an efficient member of the National Convention, 
in 1787, and nobly advocated the Constitution afterward. He removed to New York, was a mem- 
ber of the State Legislature, was also one of the first United States Senators from New York, and 
in 1796 was appointed minister to Great Britain. From 1813 lo 1826 he was a member of the 
United States Senate, and in 1825 was again sent to England as minister plenipotentiary. He 
died, near Jamaica, Long Island, in April, 1827, at the age of seventy-two years. ® Page 390. 

' Aaron Burr was bom in New Jersey, in 1756. In his twentieth year he joined the conti- 
nental army, and accompanied Arnold [note 4, page 241] in his expedition against Quebec, in 1775. 
His health compelled him to leave the army in 1779, and ho became a distinguished lawyer and 
active public man. He died on Staten Island, near New York, in 1836, at the age of eighty years. 

* Note 2, page 360. A political quarrel led to fatal results. Burr had been informed of some 
remarks made by Hamilton, in public, derogatory to his character, and he demanded a retraction. 
Hamilton considered his demand unreasonable, and refused compliance. Burr challenged him to 
fight, and Hamilton rehictantly met him on the west side of the Hudson, near Hoboken, where they 
■fought with pistols. Hamilton discharged liis weapon in the air, but Burr took fatal aim, and his 
antagonist fell. Hamilton died the next day. * Page 350. *" Page 410. 



1809.] 



JEFFERSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



397 



kinson had just been appointed governor of Louisiana, and his official position 
secured precisely the advantage which Burr sought. 

Burr went down the Ohio ; and one beautiful morning at the close of April 
[1805], he appeared at the house of Blennarhasset, an Irishman possessed of 




fine education, a large fortune, and an accomplished and enthusiastic wife.' To 
him he unfolded his grand military scheme ; and the imaginations of Blennar- 
hasset and his wife were fired. Dreams of immense wealth and power filled 
their minds ; and when Burr had departed from the quiet home of this 
gentleman, the sunshine of his house faded. Blennarhasset was a changed man. 
He placed his wealth and reputation in the keeping of an unprincipled dema- 
gogue, and lost both. At that time, the brave and noble Andrew Jackson" was 
in command of the militia of Tennessee. In May, Burr appeared at the door 
of that stern patriot, and before he left it, he had won Jackson's confidence, and 
his promise of co-operation. He also met Wilkinson at St. Louis, and there 
gave him some hints of a greater scheme than he had hitherto unfolded, which, 
that officer alleged, made him suspicious that Burr's ultimate aim was damage 



* His residence was upon an island a little below the mouth of the Muskingum River. There 
he had a fine library, beautiful conservatories, and a variety of luxuries hitherto unseen in that 
wilderness region. His home was an earthly paradise, into which the vile political serpent crawled, 
and despoiled it with his slime. Blennarhasset became poor, and died in 1831. His beautiful and 
accomphahed wife was buried by the Sisters of Charity, in the city of New York, in the year 184?. 

' Page 460. 



398 



THK NATION. 



[180L 



to the Union. However, the schemer managed the whole matter with great 
skill. He made friends with some of the dissatisfied military and naval oflBcers, 
and won their sympathies ;' and in the summer of 1806, he was very active in 
the organization of a military expedition in the West. The secresy with i 




•which it was carried on, excited the suspicions of many good men beyond the 
mountains, among whom was Jackson. Burr was suspected of a design to dis- 
member the Union, and to establish an independent empire west of the Alleg- 
hanies, with himself at the head. Those suspicions were communicated to the 
In tioual Government, which, having reason to suspect Burr of premeditated 
treason, put forth the strong arm of its power, and crushed the viper in its egg. 
Burr was arrested [February, 1807], near Fort Stoddart, on the Tombigbee 
Biver, in the present State of Alabama, by Lieutenant (afterward Major-Gen- 
eral) Gaines,' taken to Kichmond, in Virginia, and there tried on a charge of 
treason. He was acquitted. The testimony showed that his probable design 
was an invasion of Mexican provinces, for the purpose of establishing there an 
independent government. 

While Burr's scheme was ripening, diflficulties with Spain were increasing, 
and the United States were brought to the verge of a war with that country. 



' Many in the "West supposed the government was secretly favoring Burr's plans ajjainst Mex- 
ico, and, having no suspicions of any other designs, some of the traest men of that region became^ 
iome more and some less, involved in the meshes of his scheme. • Page 461. 



1809.] JEFFERSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 399 

At the same time, the continued impressment of American seamen into the 
English navy, and the interruptions to American commerce hj the British gov- 
ernment, irritated the people of the United States, and caused the President to 
recommend partial non-intercourse with Great Britain. This policy was 
adopted by Congress [April 15, 1806], the prohibition to take effect in Novem- 
ber following. This was one of the first of the retaliatory measures of the 
American government toward that of Great Britain. 

The following year [1807] is remarkable in American history as the era 
of the commencement of successful steamboat navigation. Experiments in that 
direction had been made in this country many years before, but it was 
reserved for Robert Fulton' to bear the honor of success. He spent a 
long time in France, partly in the pursuit of his profession as a portrait-painter, 
and in the study of the subject of steam navigation. Through the kindness of 
Joel Barlow, then [1797] in Paris (in whose family he remained seven years), 
he Avas enabled to study the natural sciences, modern languages, and to make 
experiments. There he became acquainted Avith Robert R. Livingston,^ and 
through his influence and pecuniary aid, on his return 
to America, he was enabled to construct a steamboat, 
and to make a voyage on the Hudson from New York 
to Albany, "against wind and tide," in thirty-six 
hours.' He took out his first patent in 1809. Within 
fifty years, the vast operations connected with steam- 
boat navigation, have been brought into existence. 
Now the puff of the steam-engine is heard upon the fulk.n s mluibuat. 
waters of every civihzed nation on the face of the globe. 

And now the progi-ess of events in Europe began to disturb the amicable 
relations which had subsisted between the governments of the United States and 
Great Britain since the ratification of Jay's treaty." Napoleon Bonaparte was 
upon the throne of France as emperor ; and in 1806 he was King of Italy, and 
his three brothers were made ruling monarchs. He was upon the full tide of 
his success and conquests, and a large part of continental Europe was now 

' Robert Fulton was born in Pennsylvania, in 1765, and was a student of West, the great 
painter, for several years. He had more genius for mechanics than the fine arts, and when he 
turned his efforts in that direction, he became very successful. He died in 1815, soon after launch- 
ing a steamship of war, at the age of fifty years. At that time there were six steamboats afloat on 
the Hudson, and he was building a steamship, designed for a voyage to St. Petersburg, in Russia. 

* Page 366. 

' This was the Clermont, Fulton's experimental boat. It was one hundred feet in length, twelve 
feet in width, and seven in depth. The engine was constructed by "Watt and Bolton, in England, 
and the hull was made by David Brown, of New York. The following advertisement appeared in 
the Albany Gazette, September 1st, 1807: "The FortJi River Steamboat will leave Paulus's Hook 
[Jersey City] on Friday, the 4th of September, at 9 in the morning, and arrive at Albany on Satur- 
day, at 9 in the afternoon. Provisions, good berths, and accommodations are provided. Tho 
charge to each passenger is as follows : 

" To Newburg, dollars, 3, tune, 14 hours. 



* Page 380. 




Poughkeepsie, " 


4, " 17 


Esopus, " 


5, " 20 


Hudson, " 


H, " 30 


Albany, 


7, " 36 



400 



THE XATION. 



[1801. 



prostrate at his feet. Although England had joined the continental powers 
against him [1803], in order to crush the Democratic revolution commenced in 
France, and the English navy had almost destroyed the French power at sea, 
all Europe was yet trembling in his presence. But the United States, by 





maintaining a strict neutrality, neither coveted his favors nor feared his power-, 
at the same time American shipping being allowed free intercourse between 
English and French ports, enjoyed the vast advantages of a profitable carrying 
trade between them. 

The belligerents, in their anxiety to damage each other, ceased, in time, to 
respect the laws of nations toward neutrals, and adopted measures at once 
destructive to American commerce, and in violation of the most sacred rights 
of the United States. In this matter. Great Britain took the lead. By an 
order in council,' that government declared [May 16, 1806] the whole coast of 
Europe, from the Elbe, in Germany, to Brest, in France, to be in a state of 
blockade. Napoleon retaliated by issuing [November 21] a decree at Berlin, 
which declared all the ports of the British islands to be in a state of blockade. 
This was intended as a blow against England's maritime superiority, and it was 

' The British privy council consists of an indefinite number of gentlemen, chosen by the sover- 
eign, and having no direct connection with the cabinet ministers. The sovereign may, under the 
advice of this council, issue orders or proclamations which, if not contrary to existing laws, are 
binding upon the subjects. These are for temporary purposes, and are called Orders in Council 




1809.] JEFFERSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 401 

the beginning of what he termed the continental system, the chief object of 
which was the ruin of Great Britain. The latter, bj another order [J anuarj 
Y, 1807J, prohibited all coast trade with France; and 
thus the gamesters played with the world's peace and 
prosperity. In spite of pacific attempts to put an 
end to these ungenerous measures, American vessels 
were seized bj both English and French cruisers, and 
American commerce dwindled to a domestic coast trade.' 
The United States lacked a navjto protect her commerce 
on the ocean, and the swarms of gun-boats" which Con- 
gress, from time to time, had authorized as a substitute, ^ felucca gun-boat. 
were quite inefficient, even as a coast-guard. 

The American merchants and all in their interest, so deeply injured by the 
^' orders" and "decrees" of the warring monarchs, demanded redress of griev- 
ances. Great excitement prevailed throughout the country, and the most bitter 
feeling was beginning to be felt against Great Britain. This was increased by 
her haughty assertion and oifensive practice of the doctrine that she had the 
right to search American vessels for suspected deserters from the British navy, 
and to carry away the suspected without hinderance. " This right Avas strenu- 
ously denied, and its policy vehemently condemned, because American seamen 
might be thus forced into the British service, under the pretense, that they were 
deserters. Indeed this had already happened.^ 

Clouds of difficulty now gathered thick and black. A crisis approached. 
Four seamen on board the United States frigate Chesapeake, were claimed as 
deserters from the British armed ship Melampus.^ They were demanded, but 
•Commodore Barron, of the Chesapeake, refused to give them up. The 

' In May, 1806, James Monroe [page 441] and "William Pinkney, were appointed to assist in 
the negotiation of a treaty with Great Britain, concerning the rights of neutrals, the imprisonment 
•of seamen, right of search, &c. A treaty was finally signed, but as it did not offer security to 
American vessels against the aggressions of Britisli ships in searching them and carrying off seamen, 
Mr. Jetierson refused to submit it to the Senate, and rejected it. The Federalists condemned the 
■course of the President, but subsequent events proved his wisdom. Mr. Piukne}', one of the special 
■envoys, was a remarkable man. He was born at Annapolis, Maryland, in March, 17G4. He was 
admitted to the bar, at the age of twenty-two years, and became one of this most profound states- 
men and brilliant orators of the age. He was a member of the Maryland Senate, iu 1811, when 
President Madison appointed him Attorney-General for the United States. He was elected a 
member of Congress, and in 1816 was appointed United States minister to St. Petersburg. After 
a short service in the Senate, his health gave way, and he died in February, 1822, in the fifty-nmth 
year of his age. 

^ These were small sailing vessels, having a cannon at the bow and stern, and manned by fully 
armed men, for the purpose of boarding other vessels. 

' England maintains the doctrine that a British subject can never become an alien. At the 
time in question, she held that she had the right to take her native-bom subjects wherever found, and 
place them in the army or navy, even though, by legal process, they had become citizens of another 
nation. Our laws give equal protection to the native and adopted citizen, and would not allow 
Great Britain to exercise her asserted privilege toward a Briton who had become a citizen of the 
United States. 

* During nine months, in the years 1796 and 1797, Mr. King [page 395], the American minis- 
ter in London, had made application for the release of two hundred and seventy-one seamen (a 
greater portion of whom were Americans), who had been seized on the false charge of being desert- 
ers, and pressed into the British service. 

^ A small British squadron, of which the Melampus was one, was lying in Lynn Haven Bay, at 
Ihe mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, at this time. It was commanded by Admiral Berkeley. 

26 



402 THE NATION. [1801. 

Chesapeake left the capes of Virginia on a cruise, on the 22d of June, 1807, 
and on the same day she was chased and attacked by the British frigate 
Leopard. Unsuspicious of danger and unprepared for an attack, Barron sur- 
rendered his vessel, after losing three men killed and eighteen wounded. The 
four men were then taken on board the Leopard., and the Chesapeake 
returned to Hampton Roads.' Investigation proved that three of the seamen, 
wlio were colored men, were native Americans, and that the fourth had been 
impressed into the British service, and had deserted. 

Forbearance was no longer a virtue. The outrage upon the Chesapeake 
aroused the nation, and provoked retaliatory measures. All parties joined in 
one loud voice of indignation, and many were very anxious for a declaration of 
war with England. The President, however, proposed a pacific course, as long 
as any hope for justice or reconciliation remained. He issued a proclamation, 
in July [1807], ordering all British armed vessels to leave the waters of the 
United States immediately, and forbidding any one to enter until full satisfac- 
tion for the present insult, and security against future aggressions, should be 
made. Although the British government understood the attack on the Chesa- 
peake as an outrage, yet diplomacy, which is seldom honest, was immediately 
employed to mistify the plain question of law and right.^ In the mean while, 
France and England continued to play their desperate game, to the detriment 
of commerce, unmindful of the interests of other nations, or the obligations 
of international law. A British order in counciP was issued on the 11th 
of November, 1807, forbidding neutral nations to trade with France or, her 
allies, except upon payment of tribute to Great Britain. Napoleon retaliated, 
by issuing, on the 17th of December, a decree at Milan, forbidding all trade 
with England or her colonies ; and authorizing the confiscation of any vessel 
found in his ports, which had submitted to English search, or paid the exacted 
tribute. In other words, any vessel having goods upon which any impost 
whatever should have been paid to Great Britain, should be denationalized., 
and subject to seizure and condemnation. These edicts were, of course, destruct- 
ive to the principal part of the foreign commerce of the United States. In 
this critical state of afiairs, the President convened Congress several weeks 
[Oct. 25, 1807] earlier than usual ; and in a confidential message [December 
18], he recommended to that body the passage of an act, levying a commercial 
embargo. Such an act was passed [December 22], which provided for the de- 
tention of all vessels, American and foreign, at our ports ; and ordered Ameri- 
can vessels abroad to return home immediately, that the seamen might be 

' Page 29*7. 

* The President forwarded instructions to Mr. Monroe, our minister to England, to demand im- 
mediate satisfaction for the outrage, and security against similar events in future. Great Britain 
thereupon dispatched an envoy extraordinary (Mr. Rose) to the United States, to settle the diffi- 
culty in question. The envoy would not enter into negotiations until the President should with- 
draw his proclamation, and so the matter stood until November, 1811 (more than four years), when 
the British government declared the attack on the Chesapeake to have been unauthorized, and pro- 
mised pecuniary aid to the i'amilies of those who were killed at that time. But Britain would not 
relinquish the right of search, and so a cause for quarrel remained. 

' Note 1, page 400. 



1809.] 



JEFFERSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



403 



trained for the inevitable war. Thus the chief commerce of the world was 
brought to a full stop. 

The operation of the embargo law was the occasion of great distress, especi- 
ally in commercial communities, yet it was sustained by the great body of the 




American people. It put patriotism and firmness to a severe test. It bore 
extremely hard upon seamen and their employers, for it spread ruin throughout 
the shipping interest. It was denounced by the Federal party, chiefly for polit- 
ical effect;' and as it failed to obtain from England and France any acknowl- 
edgment of American rights, it was repealed on the 1st of March, 1809, three 
days before Mr. Jefferson retired from office. Congress, at the same time, 
passed [March 1, 1809] a law which forbade all commercial intercourse with 
France and England, until the "orders in councir' and tlie '-decrees'' should 
be repealed. 

^ Mr. Jefferson truly wrote to a friend: " Tlie Federalists are now playing a game of the most 
mischievous tendency, without, perhaps, bein--- themselves aware of it. They are endeavoring 
to convince England that we suffer more from the embargo than they do, and that, if they wiU 
hold out awhile, we must abandon it. It is true, the time will come when we must abandon it; 
but if this is Ijefore the repeal of the orders in council, wo must abandon it only for a state of war." 
John Quincy Adams, who had resigned his seat in tlie Senate of the United States, because he dif- 
fered from the majority of his constituents in supporting tlie measures of the administration, wrote 
to the President to the effect, that from informition received by him, it was the determination of 
the ruling party (Pederahsts) in Massacliusetts, and even throughout New England, if the embargo 
was persisted in, no longer to submit to it, but to separate themselves from the Union ; and that such 
was the pressure of the embargo upon the co'iimunity, that they would be supported by the peopla 
This was explicitly denied, in after years, by the Federalist leaders. 



404 T II K NATION-. [1809. 

In the midst of the excitement on account of the foreign relations of the 
United States, another Presidential election was held. Who should be the Dem- 
ocratic candidate? was a question of some difficulty, the choice lying between 
Messrs. Madison and Monroe, of Virginia. For some time, a portion of the Dem- 
ocratic party in that State, under the leadership of the emineiit John Randolph,' 
of Roanoke, had differed from the Administration on some points of its foreign 
policy ; yet, while they acted Avith the Federalists on many occasions, they 
studiously avoided identification with that party. Mr. INIadison was the firm 
adherent of Jefferson, and an advocate and apologist of his measures, while Mr. 
Monroe' rather favored the views of Mr. Randolph and his friends. The strength 
of the two candidates was tried in a caucus of the Democratic members of the 
Virginia Legislature, and also in a caucus of the Democratic members of Con- 
gress. Mr. Madison, having a large majority on both occasions, was nominated 
for the office of President, and George Clinton for that of Vice-President. 
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney and Rufus King were the Federalist candidates. 
Madison and Clinton were elected. At the close of eight years' service, as 
Chief Magistrate of the United States, Mr. Jefferson left office [March 4, 1809], 
and retired to his beautiful Monticcllo, in the bosom of his native Virginia. 



CHAPTER IV. 

MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION. [1809 — 1817.] 

When James Madison, the fourth President of the Republic, took the 
chair of state, the country was overspread with gloom and despondency. 
Although somewhat highly colored, the report of a committee of the Massachu- 
setts Legislature, in January, 1809, gives, doubtless, a fair picture of the con- 
dition of affairs. It said: "Our agriculture is discouraged; the fisheries 
abandoned; navigation forbidden; our commerce at home restrained, if not 

' John Randolph was seventh in descent from Pocahontas [page 66], the beloved daughter of 
the emperor of the Powhatans. He was born at Petersburg, m Virginia, in June, 1773. He was 
in delicate health from infancy. He studied in Columbia College, New York, and William and 
Mary College, in Virginia. Law was his chosen profession ; yet he was too fond of hterature and 
politics to be confined to its practice. He entered public life in 1799, when he was elected to a 
seat in.Congi-ess, where he was a representative of his native State, in the lower House, for thirty 
years, with the exception of three intervals of two years each. During that time he was a member 
of the Senate for two years. He opposed the war in 1812. His political course was erratic. 
Jackson appointed him minister to St. Petersburg in 1830. His health would not permit him to 
remain there. On his return he was elected to Congress, but consumption soon laid him in the 
grave. He died at Philadelphia, in ISIay, 1 833. Mr. Randolph was a strange compound of moral 
•md intellectual qualities. He was at times almost an atheist ; at others, he was imbued with the 
deepest emotions of pietv and reverence for Deity. It is said that, on one occasion, he ascended a 
lofty spur of the Blue Ridge, at dawn, and from that magnificent observatory saw the sun rise. As 
its light burst in beautv and glorv over the vast panorama before him. lie turned to his servant and 
said, with deep emotion, "Tom, if any body says there is no God, tell them, they lie!" Thus be 
expressed the deep sense which his soul felt of the presence of a Great Creator. 

' Page. 447. 



1817.] 



MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



405 



annihilated ; our commerce abroad cut off: our navy scici, dismantled, or 
degraded to the service of cutters, or gun- boats;' the revenue extinguished; 
the course of justice interrupted; and the nation weakened by internal animos- 
ities and divisions, at the moment when it is unnecessarily and improvidentlj 
exposed to war with Great Britam, France, and Spain."' This was the lan- 
guage of the opponents of the administration, and must be taken with some 
allowance. That party was strongly opposed to Mr. Madison, because they 




//^^^^ ^^,^^j^^^ 



believed that he would perpetuate the policy of Mr. Jefferson. But when, 
dressed in a suit of plain black, he modestly pronounced his inaugural address 
[March 4, 1809], the tone and sentiment of Avhich fell like oil upon the 
troubled waters, those of his most implacable political enemies who heard him, 
could not refrain from uttering words of approbation ; and hopes were enter- 
tained by the whole nation, that his measures might change the gloomy aspect 
of affairs. 

To all unbiassed minds, no man appeared better fitted for the office of Chief 
Magistrate of the Republic, at that time of general commotion, than Mr. Mad- 
ison.' He had been Secretary of State during the wl )le administration of Mr. 



' Page 401. 

^ James Madison was born in Virginia, in March, 1751. He was educated at Princeton, New 
Jersey, and was diverted from the intended practice of the law by the charms and excitements of 
political life. He assisted in framing the first Constitution of Virginia, in 1776. He v/as a mem- 
ber of liig State Legislature and of the Executive Council, and in 1780 was a delegate in the Conti- 
nental Congress. In public life, tliere, and in his State councils, he was ever the champion of 
popular liberty. As a member of the Nationnl Convention, and supporter of the Constitution, he 



406 THK X AT I ON. [1809. 

Jefferson, and wa^ fiimiliar with every event which had contributed to produce 
the existing hostile relations between the United States and Great Britain. 
His cabinrit was composed of able men,' and in the eleventh Congress, which 
convened on the 22d of May, 1809, in consequence of the critiisal state of 
affairs," there was a majority of his pohtical friends. Yet there was a powerful 
party in the country (the Federalists) hostile to his political creed, and opposed 
to a war with England, Avhich now seemed probable. 

At the very beginning of Madison's administration, light beamed upon the 
future. Mr. Erskine, the British minister, assured the President, that such 
portions of the orders in council' as affected the United States, should be 
repealed by the 10th of June. He also assured him that a special envoy would 
soon arrive, to settle all matters in dispute between the two governments. 
Supposing the minister to be authorized by his government to make these 
assurances, the President, as empowered by Congress, issued a proclamation 
[April 19, 1809], permitting a renewal of commercial intercourse with Great 
Britain, on that day. But the government disavowed Erskine' s act, and the 
President again [August 10] proclaimed non-intercourse. The light had 
proved deceitful. This event caused great excitement in the public mind : and 
had the President then declared war against Great Britain, it would doubtless 
have been very popular. 

Causes for irritation between the two governments continually increased, 
and, for a time, political intercourse vras suspended. France, too, continueti 
its aggressions. On the 23d of March, 1810, Bonaparte issued a decree at 
Rambouillet, more destructive in its operations to American commerce, than any 
measures hitherto employed. It declared forfeit every American vessel which 
had entered French ports since March, 1810, or that might thereafter enter; 
and authorized the sale of the same, together with the cargoes — the money to 
be placed in the French treasury. Under this decree, many American vessels 
were lost, for which only partial remuneration has since been obtf^ined." Bona- 
parte justified this decree by the plea, that it was made in retaliation for the 
American decree of non-intercourse.' Three months later [May, 1810], Con- 
gress offered to resume commercial intercourse with either France or England, 
or both, on condition that they should repeal their obnoxious orders and 
decrees, before the 3d of March, 1811." The French emperor, who was always 
governed by expediency, in defiance of right and justice, feigned compliance, 
and by giving assurance [August] that such repeal should take effect in Novcm- 



was one of the wisest and ablest; and his vohiminous -UTitinE^s, purchased by Congress, display the 
most sagacious statesmanship. As a Republican, he was conservative. For eight years he was 
Prf'si lent of the United States, when he retired to private Ufe. He died in June, 1836, at the ago 
of eiu'hty-five years. 

' Robert Smith, Secretary of State; Albert Oallatiu, Secretary of the Treasury; "William Eustis, 
Secretary of War; Paul Hamilton. Secretary of the Navy; Csesar Rodney, Attorney-General. 

^ Its session lasted only about five weeks, because peace seemed probable. 

' Note 1, page 400. ' * Page 468. * Page 402. 

^ The act provided, that if either goverTiment should repeal its obnoxious acts, and if the other 
government should not do the same witliiii tliree montlis thereafter, then the first should enjoy 
«»mmercial intercourse with the United States, but tlie other shoula not. 



1817.] MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION. 407 

ber, caused the President to proclaim such resumption of intercourse. It was 
a promise intended to be broken at any moment when policy should dictate. 
American vessels continued to be seized by French cruisers, as usual, and con- 
fiscated; and in March, 1811, Napoleon declared the decrees of Berlin' and 
Milan'^ to be the fundamental laws of the empire. A new envoy from France, 
who arrived in the United States at about this time, gave official notice to the 
government, that no remuneration would be made for property seized and con- 
fiscated. 

The government of Great Britain acted more honorably, though wickedly. 
She continued her hostile orders, and sent ships of war to cruise near the prin- 
cipal ports of the United States, to intercept American merchant vessels and 
send them to England as lawful prizes. While engaged in this nefarious busi- 
ness, the British sloop of war' Little Belt, Captain Bingham, was met [May 
16, 1811], oif the coast of Virginia, by the American frigate President, Com- 
modore Rogers.^ That officer hailed the commander of the sloop, and received 
a cannon shot in reply. A brief action ensued, when Captain Bingham, after 
having eleven men killed and twenty-one wounded, gave a satisfactory answer 
to Rogers. The conduct of both officers was approved by their respective gov- 
ernments. That of the United States condemned the act of Bingham as an 
outrage without palliation ; and the government and people felt willing to take 
up arms in defense of right, justice, and honor. Powerful as was the navy of 
Great Britain, and weak as was that of the United States, the people of the 
latter were willing to accept of war as an alternative for submission, and to 
measure strength on the ocean. The British navy consisted of almost nine 
hundred vessels, with an aggregate of one hundred and forty-four thousand 
men. The American vessels of war, of large size, numbered only twelve, with 
an aggregate of about three hundred guns. Besides these, there were a great 
number of gun-boats, but these were hardly sufficient for a coast-guard. Here 
was a great disparity ; and for a navy so weak to defy a navy so strong, 
seemed madness. It must be remembered, however, that the British navy was 
necessarily very much scattered, for that government had interests to protect in 
various parts of the globe. 

The protracted interruption of commercial operations was attended with 
very serious effect upon the trade and revenue of the United States, and all 
parties longed for a change, even if it must be brought about by war with 
European governments. The Congressional elections in 1810 and 1811, proved 
that the policy of Mr. Madison's administration was sustainetl by a large ma- 
jority of the American people, the preponderance of the Democratic party 
being kept up in both branches of the National Legislature. The opposition, 
who, as a party, were unfavorable to hostilities, were in a decided minority, 
and the government had more strength in its councils than at any time during 
Jefferson's administration. 

For several years war with England had seemed inevitable, and now [1811] 

' Page 400. "^ Page 402. ' Page 415. 

* He died in the Naval Asylum, Philadelphia, in August, 1838. 



408 THE NATION. [1809. 

manj causes were accelerating the progress of events toward such a result. 
Among these, the hostile position of the Indian tribes on the north-western 
frontier of the United States, was one of the most powerful. Thej, too, had 
felt the pressure of Bonaparte's commercial system. In consequence of the 
exclusion of their furs from the continental markets, the Indian hunters found 
their traffic reduced to the lowest point. The rapid extension of settlements 
north of the Ohio was narrowing their hunting-grounds, and producing a rapid 
diminution of game ; and the introduction of whiskey, by the white people, was 
spreading demoralization, disease, and death among the Indians. These evils, 
combined with the known influence of British emissaries, finally led to open 
hostilities. 

In the spring of 1811, it was known that Tecumtha, a Shawnoe^ chief, 
Avho was crafty, intrepid, unscrupulous, and cruel, and who possessed the qual- 
ities of a great leader, almost equal to those of Pontiac," was endeavoring to 
emulate that great OttaWa by confederating the tribes of the north-west in a 
war against the people of the United States. Those over whom himself and 
twin-brother, the Prophet,' exercised the greatest control, were the Delawares, 
Shawnoese, Wyandots, Miamies, Kickapoos, Winnebagoes, and Chippewas. 
During the summer, the frontier settlers became so alarmed by the continual 
military and religious exercises of the savages, that General Harrison," then 
governor of the Indiana Territory, ° marched, with a considerable force, toward 
the town of the Prophet, situated at the junction of the Tippecanoe and 
Wabash Rivers, in the upper part of Tippecanoe county, Indiana. The 
Prophet appeared and proposed a conference, but Harrison, suspecting treach- 
ery, caused his soldiers to sleep on their arms [Nov. 6, 1811] that night. At 
four o'clock the next morning [Nov. 7] the savages fell upon the American 
camp, but after a bloody battle until dawn, the Indians were repulsed. The 
battle of Tippecanoe was one of the most desperate ever fought with the Indians, 
and the loss was heavy on both sides.' Tecumtha was not present on this occa- 
sion, and it is said the Prophet took no part in the engagement. 

These events, so evidently the work of British interference, aroused the 
spirit of the nation, and throughout the entire West, and in the Middle and 
Southern States, there was a desire for war. Yet the administration fully 
appreciated the deep responsibility involved in such a step ; and having almost 
the entire body of the New England people in opposition, the President and his 
friends hesitated. The British orders in council^ continued to be rigorously 
enforced : insult after insult was oflered to the American flag ; and the British 
press insolently boasted that the United States "could not be kicked into » 

' Page 19. ^ Page 204. 

^ In 1809, Governor Harrison had negotiated a treaty with the Miamies [page 19] and other 
tribes, by which they sold to the United States a large tract of land on both sides of the Wabash. 
The Prophet was present and made no objection ; but Tecumtha, who was absent, was greatly 
dissatisfied. The Britisli emissaries took advantage of this dissatisfaction, to inflame him and his 
people affainst the Americans. 

* Page 17. ^ Page 474. ° Note 4, page 390. 

'' Harrison had upward of sixty killed, and more than a hundred wounded. 

^ Note 1, page 400. 



1817.] MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION. 400 

war." Forbearance became no longer a virtue ; and on the 4th of April, 1812, 
Congress laid another embargo' upon vessels in American waters, for ninety 
days. On the 1st of June, the President transmitted a special message to 
Congress, in which he reviewed the difficulties with Great Britain, strongly 
portrayed the aggressions inflicted upon us by that nation, and intimated the 
necessity of war. The message was referred to the Committee on Foreign 
Relations, in the House of Representatives, a majority of whom" agreed upon, 
and reported a manifesto [June 3], as the basis of a declaration of Avar. On 
the following day [June 4, 1812], a bill, drawn up by Mr. Pinckney, the 
Attorney-General of the United States,^ declaring war to exist between the 
United States and Great Britain, was presented by Mr. Calhoun. During the 
proceedings on this subject, Congress sat with closed doors. The measure was 
finally agreed to, by both Houses, by fair majorities. It passed the House of 
Representatives by a vote of 79 to 49. On the 17th it passed the Senate by a 
vote of 19 to 13, and on that day it received the signature of the President.* 
Two days afterward [June 19], the President issued a proclamation which 
formally declared war against Groat Britain.^ This is known in history as The 
War of 1812 ; or 

THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE." 

Congress, having authorized the President to declare war, took immediate 
measures to sustain that declaration. It passed an act which gave him author- 
ity to enlist twenty-five thousand men, to accept fifty thousand volunteers, and 
to call out one hundred thousand militia for the defense of the sea-coast and 
frontiers. Fifteen millions of dollars were appropriated for the army, and 
almost three millions for the navy. But at the very threshhold of the new order 

' Page 402. Four days after this [April 8] Louisiana was admitted into the Union as a State. 

* John C. Calhoun, of South Carolina ; Felix Grundy, of Tennessee ; John Smilie, of Pennsyl- 
vania ; John A. Harper, of New Hampshire ; Joseph Desha, of Kentucky ; and Ebenezer Seaver^ 
of Massachusetts. ^ Page 400. 

* The following are the words of that important bill : "Be it enacted, etc., That war be, and the- 
same is hereby declared to exist between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and 
the dependencies thereof and the United States of America and their Territories ; and that the 
President of the United States is hereby authorized to use the whole land and naval force of the 
United States to carry the same into effect, and to issue to private armed vessels of the United 
States, commissions, or letters of marque, and general reprisal, in such form as he shall think proper, 
and under the seal of the United States, against the vessels, goods, and effects of the government 
of the said United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and the suljjects thereof." 

* The chief causes for this act were the impressment of American seamen by the British ; the 
blockade of French ports without an adequate force to sustain the act; and the British Orders in 
Council. The Federalists in Congress presented an ably- written protest, which denied the necessity 
or the expediency of war. 

' Tliis is an appropriate title, for, until the termination of that war, the United States were only 
nominally free. Blessed with prosperity, the people dreaded war, and sulimitted to many acts of 
tyranny and insult from Great Britain and France, rather than become involved in another conflict. 
Socially and commercially, the United States were dependent upon Europe, and especially upon 
England ; and the latter was rapidly acquiring a dangerous political interest here, when the war 
broke out. The war begun in 1775 was really only the first great step toward independence; the 
war begun in 1812, first thoroughly accomplished it. Franklin once heard a person speaking of 
the Revolution as the War of Independe-nce, and reproved him, saying, " Sir, you mean the Revolu- 
tion ; the war of Independence is yet to come. It was a war for Independence, but not of Inde- 



410 THE NATION. [1809. 

of things, the administration was met bj determined opposition. The Federal 
members of the House of Representatives published an address to their con- 
stituents, in which thej set forth the state of the country at that time, the 
coarse of the administration and its supporters in Congress, and the reasons of 
tl:3 minoritj for opposing the Avar. This was fair and honorable. But outside 
of Congress, a party, composed chiefly of Federalists, Avith some disaflFected 
Democrats, was organized under the name of the Peace j)arty. Its object was 
to cast such obstructions in the way of the prosecution of the Avar, as to compel 
the gOA^ernment to make peace. This movement, so unpatriotic, the offspring 
of the loAvest elements of faction, Avas froAvned upon by the most respectable 
members of the Federal party, and some of them gave the gOA'ernment their 
hearty support, Avhen it Avas necessary, in order to carry on the war with vigor 
and effect. 

The first care of the gOA^ernment, in organizing the army, Avas to select 
efficient officers. Nearly all of the general officers of tlie Revolution were in 
their graves, or Avere too old for service, and even those of subordinate rank in 
that war, Avho yet remained, Avere fir advanced in life. 
Yet upon them the chief duties of leadership were 
devolved. Henry Dearborn' was appointed major- 
general and commander-in-chief; and his principal 
brigadiers Avere James "Wilkinson," Wade Hampton,^ 
William Hull,* and Joseph Bloomfield — all of them 
esteemed soldiers of the ReA'olution. 

Hull was gOA^ernor of the Territory of Michigan, 
and held the commission of a brigadier-general. When 
war was declared, he Avas marching, with a. little more 
GENERAL DEARBORN. thau two thousand troops, from Ohio, to attempt the 

subjugation of the hostile Indians.^ Congress gaA^e 
him discretionary powers for invading Canada; but caution and preparation 
were necessary, because the British authorities, a long time in expectation of 
war, had taken measures accordingly." Feeling strong enough for the enemy, 
Hull, on the 12th of July, 1812, crossed the Detroit River Avith his whole 
force, to attack Fort Maiden, a British post near the present village of Amherst- 
burg. At SandAvicli, he encamped, and by a fatal delay, lost every advantage 
which an immediate attack might have secured. In the mean while, Fort 

■ Henry Dearborn was a native of New Hampshire, and a meritorious officer in the continental 
army. He accompanied Arnold to Quebec, and was distinguished in the battles which ruined 
Bnrgoyne [page 281]. He held civil offices of trust after the Revolution. He returned to private 
life in 1815, and died at Roxbury. near Boston, in 1829, at the age of seventy-eight years. 

' Pages 396 and 426. ' Note 3, page 427. " Note 4, page 411. ^ Page 408. 

* Canada then consisted of two provinces. The old French settlements on the St. Lawrence, 
with a population of about three hundred thousand, constituted Lower Canada ; while the more 
recent settlements above Montreal, and chiefly upon the northern shore of Lake Ontario, including 
about one hundred thousand inhabitants, composed Upper Canada. These were principally the 
families of American loyalists, who were compelled to leave the States at the close of the Revolu- 
tion. Then each province had its own governor and Legislature. The regular military force, which 
was scattered over a space of more than a thousand miles, did not exceed two thousand men; 
hence the British commanders were compelled to call for volunteers, and they used the Indiana 
to good effect, in their favor. 










/ 







'ra-wn "by H L Stephens 




STDriEMJEH: 



ISWILJL 



1817.] MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION. 411 

Mackinaw, one o^the strongest posts of the United States in the north-west,' 
was surprised and captured [July 17, 1812] hj an allied force of British and 
Indians ; and on the 5th of August, a detachment under Major Van Irlorne, 
sent by Hull to escort an approaching supplj-partj to camp, were defeated by 
some British and Indians near Brownstown, on the Huron River." These 
events, and the reinforcement of the garrison at Maiden, by General Brock, 
the British commander-in-chief, caused Hull to recross the river on the 7tli of 
August, abandon the expedition against Canada, and take post at Detroit, much 
to the disappointment of his troops, who were anxious to measure strength with 
the enemy. 

On the 9th of August, General Brock crossed the river with seven hundred 
British troops and six hundred Indians, and demanded an instant surrender of 
Detroit, threatening at the same time to give free rein to Indian cruelty in the 
event of refusal. Hull's excessive prudence determined him to surrender, 
rather than expose his troops to the hatchet. When the assailants approached, 
and at the moment when the Americans were hoping for and expecting a com- 
mand to fire, he ordered his troops to retire within the fort, and hung a white 
flag upon the wall, in token of submission. The army, fort, stores, garrison, 
and Territory, were all surrendered [August 16, 1812], to the astonishment of 
the victor himself, and the deep mortification of the American troops. Hull 
was afterward tried by a court-martiaF [1814], on charges of treason and cow- 
ardice. He was found guilty of the latter, and sentenced to be shot, but was 
pardoned by the President on account of his revolutionary services. The wholo 
country severely censured him ; and the rage of the Avar party, increased by 
the taunts of the Federalists, because of the disastrous termination of one of the 
first expeditions of the campaign, was unbounded. The difficulties with which 
Hull was surrounded — his small force (only about eight hundred eflfectivc men) ; 
the inexperience of his officers, and the rawness of his troops ; his lack of infor- 
mation, because of the interception of his communications ; and the number and 
character of the enemy — were all kept out of sight, while bitter denunciations 
were poured upon his head. In after years, he Avas permitted fully to vindicate 
his character, and the sober juflgment of this generation, guided by historic 
truth, must acquit him of all crime, and even serious error, and pity him as a 
victim of untoward circumstances.* 



' Formerly spelled Michilimackinae. It was situated upon an island of that name, near the 
Straits of Mackinaw or Miehilimakinac. 

^ On the 8th, Colonel Miller and several hundred men, sent by Hull to accomplish the object or 
Van Home, met and defeated Tecumtha [page 408] and his Indians, with a party of British, neai 
the scene of Van Home's failure. 

a He was taken to Montreal a prisoner, and was afterward exchanged for thirty British cap. 
lives. He was tried at Albany, New York. 

* Hull published his Vindication in 1824; and in 1848, his grandson published a large octavo 
volume, giving a full and thorough vindication of the character of the general, the material for 
which was drawn from official records. Hull's thorough knowledge of the character of the foe who 
menaced him, and a humane desire to spare his troops, was doubtless his sole reason for surrender- 
ing the post. A good and brave man has too long suffered the reproaches of history. William 
HuU wa-s born in Connecticut in 1753. He rose to the rank of major in the continental army, and 
was distinguished for his bravery. He was appointed governor of the Michigan Territory in 1805. 
After the close of his unfortunate campaign, he never appeared in pubUc life. He died near Boston 
in 1825. 



412 THE NATION. [1809. 

At about this time, a tragedy occurred near the head of Lake Michigan, 
which sent a thrill of horror through the land. Captain Heald, with a com- 
pany of fifty regulars, occupied Fort Dearborn, on the site of the present 
large city of Chicago.' Hull ordered him to evacuate that post in the deep 
wilderness, and hasten to Detroit. He left the public property in charge of 
friendly Indians, but had proceeded only a short distance from the fort, along 
the beach, when he was attacked by a body of Indians. Twenty-six of the reg- 
ular troops, and all of the militia, were slaughtered. A number of women and 
children were murdered and scalped ; and Captain Heald, with his wife, though 
severely wounded, escaped to Michilimackinac.^ His wife also received six 
wounds, but none proved mortal. This event occurred on the day before Hull's 
surrender [Aug. 15, 181 2 J at Detroit, and added to the gloom that overspread, 
and the indignation that flashed through, the length and breadth of the land. 

While these misfortunes were befalling the Army of the North-west,'' the 
opponents of the war were casting obvStacles in the way of the other divisions of 
the American troops operating in the State of New York, and preparing for 
another invasion of Canada.^ The governors of INIassachusetts, New Hamp- 
shire, and Connecticut, refused to allow the militia of those States to march to 
the northern frontier on the requisition of the President of the United States. 
They defended their unpatriotic position by the plea that such a requisition was 
unconstitutional, and that the war was unnecessary. The British government, 
in the mean time, had declared the whole American coast in a state of block- 
ade, except that of the New England States, whose apparent sympathy with 
the enemies of their country, caused them to be regarded as ready to leave the 
Union, and become subject to the British crown. But there was sterling 
patriotism sufficient there to prevent such a catastrophe, even if a movement, 
so fraught with evil, had been contemplated. Yet the effect was chilling to the 
best friends of the country, and the President felt the necessity of extreme cir- 
cumspection. 

Unmindful of the intrigues of its foes, however, the administration perse- 
vered ; and during the summer of 1812, a plan was matured for invading Can- 
ada on the Niagara frontier. The militia of the State of New York were 
placed, by Governor Tompkins, under the command of Stephen Van Rensselaer, ° 

' Chicago is built upon the verge of Lake Michigan and the borders of a great prairie, and is 
one of the wonders of the material and social progress of the United States. The Pottawatomie 
Indians [page 18], by treaty, left that spot to the white people in 1833. The city was laid out in 
1830, and lots were first sold in 1831. In 1840, the population was 4,470. Now [1867] it can not 
be less than 180,000! * Page 411. 

^ The forces under General Harrison were called the Army of the North-west ; those under Gen- 
eral Stephen Van Rensselaer, at Lewiston, on the Niagara River, the Army of the Center ; and 
those under General Dearborn, at Plattsburg and at Greenbush, near Albany, the Anny of the 
North. * Page 410. 

' Stephen Van Rensselaer, a lineal descendant of one of the earliest and best known of the 
Patroons [note 10, page 139] of the State of New York, was born at the manor-house, near Albany, 
in November, 1764. The War for Independence had just closed when he came into possession of 
his immense estate, at the age of twenty-one years. He engaged in politics, was a warm supporter 
of the National Constitution, and was elected Lieutenant-Governor of New York in 1795. He was 
very little engaged in polities after the defeat of the Federal party in 1800 [page 388]. After 
the Second War for Independence, he was elected to a seat in Congress ; and, by his casting vote 
in tlie N'^w York delegation, he gave the Presidency of tlie United States to John Quincy Adams. 



1817.] 



MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



413 



who was commissioned a Major-General. Intelligence of the surrender of Huir 
had inspired the Americans with a strong desire to wipe out the disgrace ; and 
the regiments were filled without much difficulty. These forces were concen- 
trated chiefly at Lewiston, on the Niagara frontier, under Van Rensselaer, and 
at Plattsburg, on Lake Champlain, and Greenbush, near Albany, under General 
Dearborn. 




The first demonstration against the neighboring province was made on the 
Niagara, in mid-autumn. In anticipation of such movement, British troops 
were strongly posted on the heights of Queenstown, opposite Lewiston ; and on 
the morning of the 13th of October [1812J, two hundred and twenty-five men, 
under Colonel Solomon Van Rensselaer," crossed over to attack them. The 
commander was severely wounded, at the landing : but his troops pressed for- 
ward, under Captains WooP and Ogilvie, successfully assaulted a battery near 



Here closed his political life, and he passed the remainder of his days in the performance of social 
and Christian duties. He was for several years president of the Board of Canal Commissioners, 
and, while in that office, he died in January, 1840, in the seventy-fifth year of his age. 

' Page 411. 

" Solomon Van Rensselaer was one of the bravest and best men of his time; and to his efforts, 
more than to those of any other man, the salvation of the American army on the northern frontier, 
at this time, was due. He died at Albany on the Sd of April, 1852. 

" John E. Wool, now [1856] Major-General in the army of the United States. 



^14: TUE jSTATION. [1809. 

the summit of the hill, and gained possession of Queenstow'n Heights. But the 
victory was not yet complete. General Sir Isaac Brock had come from Fort 
George, and with six hundred men attempted to regain the battery. The 
British were repulsed, and Brock was killed.^ In the mean while, General 
Stephen Van Rensselaer, who had crossed over, returned to Lewiston, and was 
using his most earnest eiforts to send reinforcements ; but only about one thou- 
sand troops, many of them quite vmdisciplined, could be induced to cross the 
river. These were attacked in the afternoon [Oct. 13, 1812] by fresh troops 
from Fort George, and some of their Indian ailies. Many were killed and the 
rest were made prisoners, while at least fifteen hundred of their companions-in- 
arms cowardly refused to cross to their aid. The latter excused their conduct by 
the plea, put into their mouths by the opponents of tl)e war, that they considered 
it wrong to invade the enemy's country, tlie Avar being avowedly a defensive one. 
The enemies of the administration applauded them for their conscientiousness, 
while a victory that might have led to reconciliation and peace, was lost at the 
winning moment. General Van Rensselaer, disgusted with the inefficiency 
everywhere displayed, left the service, and was succeeded by General Alex- 
ander Smyth, of Virginia This officer accomplished nothing of importance 
during the remainder of the season : and when the troops went into winter 
quarters [Dec], there appeared to have been very few achievements made by 
the American army worthy of honorable mention in history. 

While the army was suffering defeats, and became, in the mouths of the 
opponents of the administration, a staple rebuke, the little navy had acquitted 
itself nobly, and the national honor and prowess had been fully vindicated upon 
the ocean. At this time the British navy numbered one thousand and sixty 
vessels, while that of the United States, exclusive of gun-boats,^ numbered only 
twenty. Two of these were unseaworthy, and one was on Lake Ontario. Nine 
of the American vessels were of a class less than frigates, and all of them could 
not well compare in appointments with those of the enemy. Yet the Americans 
were not dismayed by this disparity, but went out boldly in their ships to meet 
the war vessels of the proudest maritime nation upon the earth.^ Victory after 
victory told of their skill and prowess. On the 19th of August, 1812, the 
United States frigate Const tiition^ Commodore Isaac Hull,'' fought the British 
frigate Guerriere,^ Captain Dacres, off the American coast, in the present track 
of ships to Great Britain. ' The contest continued about forty minutes, when 



* Sir Isaac Brock was a brave and generous officer. There is a fine monument erected to his 
memory on Queenstown Heights, a short distance from the Niagara River. ^ Page 401. 

^ At the time of the declaration of war, Commodore Rogers [page 407] was at Sandy Hook, 
New York, with a small squadron, consisting of the frigates President, Congress, United States, and 
tlie sloop-of-war Hornet. He put to sea on the 21st of June, in pursuit of a British squadron which 
had sailed as a convoy of the West India fleet. After a slight engagement, and a chase of several 
hours, the pursuit was abandoned at near midnight. The frigate Essex [page 430] went to sea on 
the 3d of July; the Constitution, on the 12tb. The brigs Nautilus, Viper, and Vixen were then 
cruising off the coast, and the sloop Wasp was at sea on her return from France. 

* Isaac Hull was made a lieutenant in the navy in 1798, and was soon distinguished for skill 
and bravery. He rendered important service to his country, and died in Philadelphia in February, 
1843. 

' This vessel had been one of a British squadron which gave the Constitution a long and close 
chase about a month before, during which the nautical skill of HuU was most signally displayed. 




1817.] MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION. 415 

Dacres surrendered;' and his vessel was such a complete wreck, that the victor 
burned her. The Constitution, it is said, was so little damaged, that she was 
ready for action the following day. This victory had a powerful effect on the 
public mind in both countries. 

On the 18th of October, 1812, the United States sloop-of-war, Wasp, 
Captain Jones, captured the British brig Fi^olic, off the 
coast of North Carolina, after a very severe conflict for 
three-quarters of an hour. The slaughter on board the 
Frolic was dreadful. Only three officers and one seaman, 
of eighty-four, remained unhurt. The others were killed 
or badly wounded. The Wasp lost only ten men. Her 
term of victory was short, for the same afternoon, the 
British seventy-four gun ship Poictiers captured both 
vessels. A Aveek afterward [October 25], the frigate sloop-oi--\vau. 

United States, Commodore Decatur,' fought the British 

frigate Macedonian, west of the Canary Islands, for almost two hours. After 
being greatly damaged, and losing more than one hundred men, in killed and 
wounded, the 3Iacedonian surrendered. Decatur lost only five killed and 
seven wounded ; and his vessel was very little injured. A few weeks after- 
ward [December 29, 1812], the Constitution, then commanded by Commodore 
Bainbridge,^ became a victor, after combatting the British frigate Java for 
almost three hours, off San Salvador, on the coast of Brazil. The Java had 
four hundred men on board, of whom almost two hundred were killed or 
wounded. The Constitution was again very little injured ; but she made such 
havoc with the Java, that Bainbridge, finding her incapable of floating long, 
burned her [January 1, 1813], three days after the action. 

The Americans were greatly elated by these victories. Nor were they con- 
fined to the national vessels. Numerous privateers, which now swarmed upon 
the ocean, were making prizes in every direction, and accounts of their exploits 
filled the newspapers. It is estimated that during the year 1812, upward of 
fifty British armed vessels, and two hundred and fifty merchantmen, with an 
aggregate of more than three thousand prisoners, and a vast amount of booty, 
were captured by the Americans. These achievements wounded British pride 
in a tender part, for England claimed the appellation of "mistress of the seas." 
They also strengthened the administration ; and at the close of the year, naval 
armaments were in preparation on the lakes, to assist the army in a projected 
invasion of Canada the following spring. 

At the close of these defeats upon land, and these victories upon the ocean, 
the election of President and Vice-President of the United States, and also of 
members of Congress, occurred. The administration was strongly sustained by 
the popular vote. Mr. Madison was re-elected, with Elbridge Gerry^ as Vice- 
President — George Clinton having died at Washington in April of that year." 



' On the Chierriere were seventy-nine killed and wounded. The Constitution lost seven killed 
and seven wounded. " Page 392. 

' Page 391. •• Note 1, page 385. * Note 5, page 350. 



416 THE NATION. [1813. 

A fraction of the Democratic party, and most of the Federalists, voted for De 
Witt Clinton' for President, and Jared Ingersoll, for Vice-President. Not- 
withstanding the members of Congress then elected, were chiefly Democrats, it 
was evident that the opposition was powerful and increasing, particularly in the 
eastern States, yet the President felt certain that the great body of the people 
were favorable to his war policy. 



CHAPTER V. 

THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. [1813.] 

During the autumn of 1812, the whole western country, incensed by 
Hull's surrender, seemed filled with the zeal of the old Crusaders.^ Michigan 
had to be recovered,^ and the greatest warlike enthusiasm prevailed. Volun- 
teers had gathered under local leaders, in every settlement. Companies were 
formed and equipped in a single day, and were ready to march the next. For 
several weeks the volunteers found employment in driving the hostile Indians 
from post to post, in the vicinity of the extreme western settlements. They 
desolated their villages and plantations, after the manner of Sullivan, in ITTO,* 
and the fiercest indignation against the white people was thus excited among 
the tribes, which, under the stimulus of their British allies, led to terrible 
retaliations.^ So eager were the people for battle, that the snows of winter in 
the great wilderness, did not keep them from the field. The campaign of 1813 
opened with the year. Almost the entire northern frontier of the United 
States was the chief theatre of operations. The army of the West," under 
General Harrison,' was concentrating at the head of Lake Erie ; that of the 
Ce?itre,^ now under Dearborn, was on the banks of the Niagara River; and 
that of the North," under Hampton, was on the borders of Lake Champlain. 
Sir George Prevost was the successor of Brock'" in command of the British 
army in Canada, assisted by General Proctor in the direction of Detroit," and 
by General Sheaffe in the vicinity of Montreal and the lower portions of Lake 
Champlain. 

Brave and experienced leaders had rallied to the standard of Harrison in 
the north-west. Kentucky sent swarms of her young men, from every social 

' Page 456. "^ Note 5, page 38. = Page 411. ■• Page 304. 

^ Harrison early took steps to relieve tlie frontier posts. These were Fort Harrison, on tht 
Wabash; Fort Wayne, on the Miami of the lakes; Fort Defiance [Note 6, page 374]; and Fori. 
Deposit, to which the Indians laid siege on tlie 12th of September. Generals Winchester, Tupper, 
and Payne, and Colonels Wells, Scott, Lewis, Jennings, and Allen, were the chief leaders against 
the savages. Operations were carried on vigorously, further west. Early in October, almost four 
thousand volunteers, cliiefly mounted riflemen, under General Hopkins, had collected at Vincennes 
[page 303] for an expedition against the towns of the Peoria and other Indians, in the Wabash 
country. It was this formidable expedition, sanctioned by Governor Shelby, which produced the 
greatest devastation in the Indian country. ^ Note 3, page 412. ' Page 474. 

* Note S, page 412. « Note 3, page 412. " Page 411. " Page 412. 



1813.] 



THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



417 



rank, led by the veteran Shelby/ and the yeomanry of Ohio and its neighbor- 
hood hastened to the field. So numerous were the volunteers, that Harrison 
was compelled to issue an order against further enlistments, and many a warm 
heart, beating with desire for military glory, was chilled by disappointment. 
General Harrison chose the west end of Lake Erie as his chief place of mustei^ 




with the design of making a descent upon the British at Maiden and Detroit,' 
and by securing possession of those posts, recover Michigan and the forts west 
of it. Early in January [10th, 1813], General Winchester, on his way from 
the southward, with eight hundred young men, chiefly Kentuckians, reached 
the Maumee Rapids.' There he was informed [January 13, 1813] that a 
party of British and Indians had concentrated at Frenchtown, on the river 
Raisin,' twenty-five miles south of Detroit. He rnmediately sent a detachment, 

' Isaac Shelby was born in Maryland, in 1750. He entered military life in 1774, and went to 
Kentucky as a land-surveyor, in 1775. He engaged in the War of the Revolution, and was dis- 
tinguished in the battle on King's Mountain [page 319] in 1780. He was made governor of Ken- 
tucky in 1792, and soon afterward retired to private life, ^rom which he was drawn, first in 1812, to 
the duties of Chief Magistrate of his State, and agai-, m 1813. to lead an army to the field against 
his old enemy. He died in 1826, when almost seventy-six years of age. * Page 412. 

' Note 7, page 374. 

^ Now a portion of the flourishing village of Monroe, Michigan, two or three miles from Lake, 
Erie. The Raisin derived its name from the fact, that in former years great quantities of grapes 
clustered upon its banks. 

27 



418 TIIF, NATION. [1813. 

under Colonels Allen and Lewis, to protect the inhabitants in that direction. 
Finding Frenchtown in the possession of the enemy, thej successfully attacked 
[January 18] and routed them, and held possession until the arrival of Win- 
chester [January 20], with almost three hundred men, two days afterward. 

General Proctor, who was at Maiden, eighteen miles distant, heard of the 
advance of Winchester, and proceeded immediately and secretly, with a com- 
bined force of fifteen hundred British and Indians, to attack him. They fell 
upon the American camp at dawn, on the morning of the 22d of January. 
After a severe battle and heavy loss on both sides, Winchester,' who had been 
made a prisoner by the Indians, surrendered his troops on the condition, agreed 
to by Proctor, that ample protection to all should be given. Proctor, fearing 
the approach of Harrison, who was then on the Lower Sandusky, immediately 
marched for Maiden, leaving the sick and wounded Americans behind, without 
a guard. After following him some distance, the Indians turned back [January 
23], murdered and scalped' the Americans who were unable to travel, set fire 
to dwellings, took many prisoners to Detroit, in order to procure exorbitant 
ransom prices, and reserved some of them for inhuman torture. The indiffer- 
ence of Proctor and his troops, on this occasion, was criminal in the highest 
degree, and gave just ground for the dreadful suspicion, that they encouraged 
the savages in their deeds of blood. Oftentimes after that, the war-cry of the 
Kentuckians was, "Remember the River Raisin!" The tragedy was keenly 
felt in all the western region, and especially in Kentucky, for the slain, by bul- 
let, arrow, tomahawk, and brand, were generally of the most respectable fam- 
ilies in the State ; many of them young men of fortune and distinction, with 
numerous friends and relations. 

Harrison had advanced to the Maumee Rapids, Avhen the intelligence of the 
afiair at Frenchtown reached him. Supposing Proctor would 
press forward to attack him, he fell back [January 23, 1813] ; 
but on hearing of the march of the British toward Maiden, he 
advanced [February 1] to the rapids, with twelve hundred men, 
established a fortified camp there, and called it Fort Meigs, ^ in 
honor of the governor of Ohio. There he was besieged 
by Proctor several weeks afterward [May 1], who was 
at the head of more than two thousand British and Indians. 
On the fifth day of the siege. General Clay* arrived [May 5] 
with twelve hundred men, and dispersed the enemy. A large 
FORT MEIGS portiou of his troops, while unwisely pursuing the fugitives, were 
surrounded and captured ; and Proctor returned to the siege. 
The impatient Indians, refusing to listen to Tecumtlia,^ their leader, deserted 

* James "Winchester was bom in Maryland in 1156. He was made brigadier-general in 1812 ; 
resigned his commission in 1815 ; and died in Tennessee in 1826. ' Note 4, page 14. _ 

^ Fort Meigs was erected on the south ide of the Maumee, nearly opposite the former British 
post [note 8, page 374], and a short distance trom the present village of Perrysburg. 

* Green Clay was born in Virginia in 1757, was made a brigadier of Kentucky volunteers early 
in 1813, and died in October, 1826. 

* Page 408. Tecumtha came with the largest body of Indians ever collected on the northern 
frontier. 




1813.] THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 419 

the British on the eighth day [May 8 J ; and twenty-four hours aftervrard, 
Proctor abandoned the siege and returned to Maiden [May 9], to prepare for 
a more formidable invasion. Thus terminated a siege of thirteen days, during 
■which time the fortitude and courage of the Americans were wonderfully dis- 
played in the presence of the enemy. The Americans lost in the fort, eighty- 
one killed, and one hundred and eighty-nine Avounded. 

For several weeks after the siege of Fort Meigs, military operations were 
suspended by both parties. Here, then, let us take a brief retrospective glance. 
Congress assembled on the 2d of November, 1812, and its councils were divided 
by fierce party spirit, which came down from the people. The Democrats had 
a decided majority, and therefore the measures of the administration were sus- 
tained. The British government now began to show some desire for reconcilia- 
tion. Already the orders in council had been repealed, and the Prince Regent' 
demanded that hostilities should cease. To this the President replied, that being 
now at war, the United States would not put an end to it, unless full provisions 
were made for a general settlement of differences, and a cessation of the practice 
of impressment, pending the negotiation. At about the same time a law wavS 
passed, prohibiting the employment of British seamen in American vessels. The 
British also proposed an armistice, but upon terms which the Americans could 
not accept. Indeed, all propositions from that quarter were inconsistent with 
honor and justice, and they were rejected. When these attempts at reconcilia- 
tion had failed, the Emperor Alexander of Russia offered his mediation. The 
government of the United States instantly accepted it,'^ but the British govern- 
ment refused it ; and so the war went on. Congress made provision for prose- 
cuting it with vigor ; and the hope lighted by Alexander's offer, soon faded. 

The American troops in the West had remained at Fort Meigs and vicinity. 
Toward the close of July [July 21, 1813], about four thousand British and 
Indians, under Proctor and Tecumtba,^ again appeared before that fortress, then 
commanded by General Clay. Meeting with a vigorous re- 
sistance, Proctor left Tecumtha to Avatch the fort, while he 
marched [July 28], vfith. five hundred regulars and eight 
hundred Indians, to attack Fort Stephenson, at Lower San- 
dusky,* which was garrisoned by about one hundred and fifty 

'' ' O -^ . •' FOKT SANDUSKY. 

young men,^ commanded by Major Croghan, a brave soldier, 




' "When, in consequence of mental infirmity, George the Third became incompetent to reign, in 
February, 1811, his son, George, Prince of "Wales, and afterward George the Fourth, was made 
regent, or temporary ruler of the realm. He retained the ofBce of king, pro tempore, until the death 
of his father, in 1820. 

' The President appointed, as commissioners, or envoys extraordinary, to negotiate a treaty of 
peace with Great Britain, under the Russian mediation, Albert Gallatin, John Quincy Adams, and 
James A. Bayard Mr. Adams was then American minister at the Russian court, and was joined 
by Messrs. Gallatin and Bayard in June following. ' Page 408. 

* On the west bank of the Sandusky River, about fifteen miles south fi^om Sandusky Bay. The 
area witliin ihe pickets [note 1, page 127] was about an acre. The fort was made of regular em- 
bankments of earth and a ditch, with bastions and block-houses [note 3, page 192] and some rude 
log buildings within. The site is in the village of Fremont, Ohio. 

' The greater portion of the garrison were very young men, and some of them were mere 
youths 




420 THE NATION. [18ia 

then only twenty-one years of age.' Proctor's demand for surrender was accom- 
panied by the usual men^i'Ce of Indian massacre ; but it 
did not intimidate Croghan.^ After a severe cannonade^ 
had made a breach, about five hundred of the besiegers 
attempted to rush in and take the place by assault [Aug. 
2, 1813] ; but so terribly were they met by grape-shot' 
from the only cannon in the fort, that they recoiled, panic- 
stricken, and the whole body fled in confusion, leaving 
one hundred and fifty of their number killed or wounded. 
The Americans lost only one man killed, and seven 
wounded. This gallant defense was universally ap- 
MAjoR cRucaiAx. pjaudcd,^ aud it had a powerful eflect upon the Indians. 
Proctor and Tecumtha left for Detroit, after this noble defense of Fort 
Stephenson, and the British abandoned all hope of capturing these western 
American posts, until they should become masters of Lake Erie. But while 
ihe events just narrated were in progress, a new power appeared in the conflict 
in the West and North, and complicated the difficulties of the enemy. In the 
autumn of 1812, Commodore Chauncey had fitted out a small naval armament 
at Sackett's Harbor, to dispute the mastery, on Lake Ontario, with several 
British armed vessels then afloat.^ And during the summer of 1813, Commo- 
dore Oliver Hazzard Perry had prepared, on Lake Erie, an American squadron 
of nine vessels,' mounting fifty-four guns, to co-operate with the Army of the 
AVest. The British had also fitted out a small squadron of six vessels, carrying 
sixty- three guns, commanded by Commodore Barclay. Perry's fleet was ready 
by the 2d of August, but some time was occupied in getting several of his ves- 
sels over the bar in the harbor of Erie. The hostile fleets met near the west- 
ern extremity of Lake Erie on the morning of the 10th of September, 1813, 
and a very severe battle ensued. The brave Perry managed with the skill of 
an old admiral, and the courage of the proudest soldier. His flag-ship, the 
Lawrence^ had to bear the brunt of the battle, and very soon she became an 
unmanageable wreck, having all her crew, except four or five, killed or 
wounded. Perry then left her, in an open boat, and hoisted his flag on the 
Niagara at the moment when that of the Lawrence fell. With this vessel he 

* George Croghan was a nephew of George Rogers Clarke [page 300]. He afterward rose to 
the rank of colonel, and held the oflBce of inspector-general. He died at New Orleans in 1849. 

" In reply to Proctor's demand and threat, he said, in substance, that when the for^ should be 
taken there would be none left to massacre, as it would not be given up while there was a man left 
to fight. 

^ The British employed six six-pounders and a howitzer, in the siege. A ho'U'itzer is a piece 
of ordnance similar to a mortar, for hurling bomb-shells. * Note 4, page 242. 

' Major Croghan was immediately promoted to the raiik of lieutenant- colonel; and the ladies 
of Chillicothe gave him an elegant sword. 

* Chauncey's squadron consisted of six vessels, mounting thirty-two guns, in all. The British 
Bquadron consisted of the same number of vessels, but mounting more than a hundred guns. Not- 
withstanding this disparity, Chauncey attacked them near Kingston [note 5, page 180] early in 
November, damaged them a good deal, and captured and carried into Sackett's Harbor, a schooner 
belonging to the enemy. He then captured another schooner, which had $12,000 in specie on board, 
and the baggage of the deceased General Brock. See page 414. 

' iawreiice (flag-ship), 20 guns; Niagara, 20; Caledonian, 3; shooner Ariel, 4; Scorpion, 2; 
Somers, 2 guns and 2 swivels ; sloop Trippe, and schooners Tigress and Porcupine, of 1 gun eaca. 




Perry ox Lake Erie. 



1813.] 



THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



423 



passed through the enemy's line, pouring broadsides, right and left, at half 
pistol-shot distance. The remainder of the squadron followed, with a fair wind, 
and the victory was soon decided. At four o'clock in the afternoon, every 
British vessel had surrendered to him ;' and before sunset, he had sent a mes- 
senger to General Harrison with the famous dispatch, " We have met the 
enemy, and they are ours." This victory was hailed with unbounded demon- 




0,^^k^e^rny 



strations of joy. For a moment, party rancor was almost forgotten ; and bon- 
fires and illuminations lighted up the whole country. 

Perry's victory was followed by immediate and energetic action on the part 
of Harrison. The command of Lake Erie now being secured, and a reinforce- 
ment of four thousand Kentucky volunteers, under Governor Shelby, the old 
hero of King's Mountain,^ having arrived [Sept. 17, 1813], the general pro- 
ceeded to attack Maiden and attempt the recovery of Detroit. The fleet con- 
veyed a portion of the troops across the lake [Sept 27], but on their arrival at 
Maiden, it had been deserted by Proctor, who was fleeing, with Tecumtha and 
his Indians, toward the Moravian village, on the Thames, eighty miles from 

' The carnage was very great, in proportion to the numbers engaged. The Americans lost 
twenty-seven killed, and ninetv-six wounded. The British lost about two hundred m kiUed and 
wounded, and six hundred prisoners. Perry's treatment of his prisoners received the highest ap- 
plause. Commodore Barclay declared that his humane conduct was sufficient to immortalize him. 
That brave commander was born at Newport, Rhode Island, in 1785. He entered the service aa 
midshipman, in 1198. He continued in active service after the close of the Second "War for Inde- 
pendence, and died of yellow fever, in the West India Seas, in 1819. It was his brother Com- 
modore M. C. Perry, who, as we shall observe, effected a treaty with Japan. Page 417. 



424 THE NATION. [1813. 

Detroit.' A body of Americans took possession of Detroit on the 29th of Sep- 
tember ; and on the 2d of October, Harrison and Shelbj, with Colonel Richard 
M. Johnson and his cavalry (thirty-five hundred strong), started in pursuit of 
the enemy.* They overtook them [Oct. 5] at the Moravian town, when a des- 
perate battle ensued. Tecumtha was slain ;^ and then his dismayed followers, 
who had fought furiously, broke and fled. Almost the whole of Proctor's com- 
mand were killed or made prisoners, and the general himself narrowly escaped, 
with a few of his cavalry. Here the Americans recaptured six brass field- 
pieces which had been surrendered by Hull, on two of which were engraved the 
words, "Surrendered by Burgoyne at Saratoga."^ These pieces are now at 
the United States military post of "West Point, on the Hudson.^ 

The battle on the Thames was a very important one. By that victory, all 
that HulF had lost was recovered ; the Indian confederacy^ was completely 
broken up, and the war on the north-western borders of the Union was termi- 
nated. The name of Harrison was upon every lip ; and throughout the entire 
Republic, there was a general outburst of gratitude. He was complimented by 
Congress, and by various public bodies ; and a member of the House of Repre- 
sentatives asserted, in his place, that his victory was "such as would have 
secured to a Roman general, in the best days of the republic, the honors of a 
triumph." Security now being given to the frontier, General Harrison dis- 
missed a greater portion of the volunteers ; and leaving General Cass, with 
about a thousand regulars, to garrison Detroit, proceeded [Oct. 23, 1813] to 
Niagara, with the remainder of his troops, to join the Army of the Center,* 
which had been making some endeavors to invade Canada. In the mean while, 
an Indian war had been kindled in the South ;^ and on the ocean, the laurel 
wreaths of triumph won by the Americans during 1812,'" had been interwoven 
with garlands of cypress on account of reverses. Let us turn a moment to the 
operations of the Army of the North." 

Hostilities were kept up on portions of the northern frontier, during the 
winter, as well as in the West. In February [1813], a detachment of British 
soldiers crossed the St. Lawrence on the ice, from Prescott to Ogdensburg, and 
under pretense of seeking for deserters, committed robberies. Major Forsyth, 
then in command of riflemen there, retaliated. This was resented, in turn, by 



' In the present town of Orford, West Canada. 

^ Commodore Perry and General Cass (late United States Senator from Michigan) accom- 
jjanied General Harrfson as volunteer aids. The Americans moved with such rapidity that 
ihey traveled twenty-six miles tlie first day. 

^ Tecumtha was "then only about forty years of age. lie was a man of great ability, and had 
he been born and educated in civilized society, his powerful intellect would have made him one of 
the most distinguished characters of the age". He possessed great dignity, and always maintained 
it in his deportment. On one occasion he was to attend a conference held with Harrison. j_ 'lircle 
of the company had been formed ; and when he came and entered it, there was no seat foi im, 
Harrison's aid "having taken the one by the side of the general, intended for him. Harrison \ ?r- 
ceived that Tecumtha was offended, and told his aid to invite the chief to the seat near him. The 
aid politelv said to Tecumtha, "Your fother requests you to take a seat by his side." The ofiTended 
chief drew his blanket around him, and, with an air of great dignity, said, "The Great Spirit is mj 
father, and I wOl repose on the bosom of my mother;" and then sat down upon the ground. 

* Page 281. * Note 2, page 324. " Page 411. ' Page 408. 

* Page 412. » Page 428. " Page 41a. " Page 412. 



1813.J THE SECOXD WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 425 

a British force of twelve hundred men, who crossed on the 21st of February, 
and after a conflict of an hour, drove out the few military defenders of Ogdens- 
burg, plundered and destroyed a large amount of property, and then returned 
to Canada.' These events accelerated the gathering of the militia in that quar- 
ter. Bodies of new levies arrived, almost daily, at Sackett"s Harbor, but theso, 
needing discipline, were of little service, as a defense of the country between 
that point and Ogdensburg. 

Being unable to afford assistance to the exposed points in that region. Gen- 
eral Dearborn, the commander-in-chief,'' resolved to attempt the capture of 
York (now Toronto), the capital of Upper Canada, and the principal depositoiy 
of British military stores for the supply of western garrisons. He embarked 
seventeen hundred troops on board the fleet of Commodore Chauncey,^ at Sack- 
ett's Harbor, on the 25tli of April ; and two days afterward [April 27], they 
latided on the beach at York, about two miles west from the British works, in 
the face of a galling fire from regulars and Indians, 
Under General Sheaffe. These were soon driven back to 
their fortifications, and the Americans, under General 
Pike,* pressed forward, captured two redoubts, and were 
advancing upon the main work, Avhen the magazine of the 
fort blew up,^ hurling stones and timbers in every direc- 
tion, and producing great destruction of life among the 
assailants. General Pike was mortally wounded, but he 
lived loner enough to know that the enemy had fled, and 

O O J 7 GENERAL PIKE. 

that the American flag waved in triumph over the fort 

at York." The command then devolved on Colonel Pearce ; and at four o'clock 
in the afternoon, the town was in possession of the Americans. General Dear- 
born, who had remained with the fleet, landed soon after the fall of Pike, but 
did not assume the immediate command until after the surrender of the town. 

AVhen the victory was completed, the fleet and troops returned [May 1] to 
Sackett's Harbor, but soon afterward proceeded to attack Fort George, on the 
western shore of Niagara River, near its mouth. After a brief defense [May 
27, 1813], the garrison fled to Burlington Heights, at the western extremity of 
Lake Ontario,' thirty-five miles distant, closely pursued by a much larger force, 




* The Americans lost, in killed and wounded, twenty men. The British loss was about double 
that number. "" Page 410. ' Page 420. 

* General Dearborn had given the command of this expedition to Brigadier-General Zebulon M. 
Pike, a brave and useful officer, who had been at the head of an expedition, a few years carUer, to 
explore the country around the head waters of the Mississippi. He was born in New Jersey, in 
1779. He died on board the flag-ship of Commodore Chauncey, with the captured British flag 
under his head, at the age of thirty-four years. In the burial-ground attached to Madison barracks, 
at Sackett's Harbor, is a dilapidated wooden monument erected over the remains of General Pike 
and some of his companions in arms. When the writer visited the spot, in 1860, it was wasting 
with decay, and falling to the earth. Such a neglect of the burial-place of the illustrious dead, is a 
disgrace to our government. 

^ The British had laid a train of wet powder communicating with the magazine, for the purpose, 
and when they retreated, they fired it. 

^ General Slieaffe escaped, with the principal part of the troops, but lost all his baggage, books, 
papers, and a large amount of public property. 

' At the head of Burlington Bay, in Canada. 



426 THE NATION. [1813. 

under Generals Chandler' and Winder.^ In this affair, Colonel (now Lieutenant- 
General) Scott was distinguished for his skill and bravery. On the night of 
the 6tli of June, the British fell upon the American camp, at Stony Creek," but 
were repulsed. It was very dark, and in the confusion both of the American 
generals were made prisoners. 

A British squadron appeared before Sacketfs Harbor on the same day 
[May 27] that the Americans attacked Fort George : and two days afterward 
[May 29j Sir George Prevost and a thousand soldiers landed in the face of a 
severe fire from some regulars^ stationed there. The regular force of the Amer- 
icans consisted of only a few seamen, a company of artillery, and about two 
hundred invalids — not more than five hundred men in all. General Jacob 
Brown, the commander at that station, rallied the militia, and their rapid 
gathering, at and near the landing-place, back of Horse Island, so alarmed 
Prevost, lest they should cut off his retreat, that he hastily re-embarked, leaving 
almost the Avhole of his wounded behind. Had he been aware of the condition 
of his opposers, he could have made an easy conquest of Sackett's Harbor. The 
raw militia had become panic-stricken at the first, and when Prevost retreated, 
they, too, were endeavoring to make their way to places of safety in the 
country. 

A change in the administration of military affairs occurred soon after the 
event a^ Sackett's Harbor. For some time, the infirmities of General Dearborn, 
the commander-in-chief,^ had disqualified him for active participation in the 
operations of the army, and in June [1813] he withdrew from the service. He 
was succeeded in command by General James Wilkinson," who, like Dearborn, 
had been an active young oflicer in the War for Independence. General John 
Armstrong,^ then Secretary of War, had conceived another invasion of Canada, 
by the united forces of the armies of the Center and North.* For this purpose 
a httle more than seven thousand men were concentrated at French Creek on 
the 5th of November, 1813, and on that morning went down the St. Lawrence 
in boats, with the intention of co-operating with about four thousand troops 
under Hampton,^ in an attack upon Monti*eal. They landed the same evening, 
a few miles abave the British fort at Prescott, opposite Ogdensburg. It being 
foggy, Wilkinson attempted to pass down the river upon the flotilla commanded 
by General Brown. The fog cleared away, and the moon revealed the Amer- 



^ John Chandler was a native of Massachusetts. Some j'^ars after the war he was United 
States Senator from Maine. He died at Augusta, in that State, in 1841. ^ Page 436. 

^ In the present township of Saltfleet, Canada West. In this affair the Americans lost, in killed, 
wounded, and missing, one hundred and fifty-four. 

" Note 6, page 185. * Page 410. 

^ James Wilkinson was bom in Maryland, in 1757, and studied medicine. ^ He joined the con- 
tinental army at Cambridge, in 1775, and continued in service during the war. He commanded 
the western division of the United States army at the beginning of the century, and became some- 
what involved, as we have seen [page 396], in Burr's scheme, in 1806. He died near the city of 
Mexico, in 1825, at the age of sixty-eight years. 

' Note 4, page 349. John Armstrong'was a son of Colonel John Armstrong, of Pennsylvania 
[page 191], and was born at Carlisle, in that State, in 1758. He served in the War of the Revolu- 
tion; was Secretary of the State of Pennsylvania ; minister to France in 1804; Secretary of War 
in ] 813 ; and died in Duchess county, New York, in 1843. ^ Note 3, page 412. 

" Page 410. 



1813.] THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 427 



icans to the garrison of the fort. The latter immediatelj opened a heavy fire, 
and being thus annoyed by the enemy on shore, and by gun-boats" in his rear, 
Wilkinson landed Brown and a strong detachment to go forward and disperse 
quite a large force near Williamsburg, and to cover the descent of the boats. 
A severe battle ensued [November 11] in which the Americans lost more than 
three hundred men in killed and Avounded, and the British about two hundred. 
This is know^n as the battle of Chrysler's Field. The locality is on the northern 
shore of the St. Lawrence, a little more than thirty miles below Ogdensburg, 
and about ninety above Montreal. 

General Wilkinson arrived at St. Regis' the next day, with the main body, 
when he was informed that no troops from the army of the North would join 
him.^ lie therefore abandoned the expedition against Montreal, and went 
into winter quarters at French Mills (now Fort Covington, in St. Lawrence 
county), about nine miles east of St. Regis. A little later, some stirring events 
occurred on the Niagara frontier. General M'Clure, commander at Fort 
George,^ burnt the Canadian village of Newark on the 10th of December. 
Two days later [December 12, 1813] he was 
compelled by the British to al)andon Fort 
George. A strong force of British and Indians 
then surprised and captured [December 19] 
Fort Niagara, on the east side of the Niagara 

River, near its mouth ;^ and in retaliation for "" fort Niagara 1813 
the burning of Newark, they laid Youngstown, 

Lewiston, Manchester (now Niagara Falls), and the Tuscarora Indian village, 
in Niagara county, in ashes. On the 30th, the little villages of Black Rock 
and Buffalo^ Avere also consumed, and a large amount of public and private 
property was destroyed. With these events ended the campaign of 1813, in 
the North. 

Aflairs in the extreme South assumed a serious aspect during the summer 
of 1813. In the spring of that year, Tecumseh (who Avas slain on the Thames 
a few months later)' Avent among the Southern tribes, to arouse them to Avage 
"war upon the Avhite people. The powerful Creeks" yielded to his persuasions ; 
and late in August [30th], a large party of them surprised and captured Fort 
Mimms, on the Alabama River, ^ and massacred about four hundred men, 




' Page 401. 

^ This is an old French and Indian settlement on the Rt^ Lawrence, at the month of the St. 
Regis River, about fifty miles below Ogdensburg. The dividing line (45th degree) between the 
United States and Canada, passes through the center of the vDlage. 

' There was an enmity between Wilkinson and Hampton, and Armstrong resolved to command 
the expedition himself, to prevent trouble on account of precedence. He joined the array at 
Sackett's Harbor, but soon returned to Washington, for he and Wilkinson could not agree. To the 
jealousies and bickerings of these old officers, must the disasters of the land troops be, in a great 
degree, attributed. General Hampton did move forward toward Canada, but finally fell back to 
Plattsburg, and leaving the command with General Izard, returned to South Carolina. He died at 
Columbia, South Carolina, in 1835, aged eighty-one years. ■• Page 414. ^ Page 200. 

' Buffalo was then a small village, containing about fifteen hundred inhabitants, and was utterly 
destroyed. It is now [1867] one of the stateliest commercial cities on the continent, witli a popu- 
lation of not much less than one hundred thousand. ' Page 424*. ^ Page 30, 

" On the east side of the Alabama, about ten miles above its junction v,'ith the Tonibigljee. 



428 THE NAT I ox. [1813. 

women, and children. This event aroused the whole South. General Andrew 
Jackson, ' accompanied by General Coflfee, marched into the Creek country, with 
twenty-five hundred Tennessee militia, and prosecuted a subjugating war against 
them, with great vigor. 

On the 3d of November, General Cofifee,^ with nine hundred men, sur- 
rounded an Indian force at Tallushatchee,^ and killed two hundred of them. 
Not a warrior escaped. Within ten weeks afterward, bloody battles had been 
fought at Talladega' [November 8], Autossee' [November 29], and Emucfau* 
[January 22d, 1814], and several skirmishes had also taken place. The 
Americans were always victorious, yet they lost many brave soldiers. At 
length the Creeks established a fortified camp at the Great Horseshoe Bend of 
the Tallapoosa River,' and there a thousand warriors, with their women and 
children, determined to make a last defensive stand. The Americans sur- 
rounded them, and Jackson, with the main body of his army, attacked them on 
the 27th of March, 1814. The Indians fought desperately, for they saw no 
future for themselves, in the event of defeat. Almost six hundred warriors 
were slain, for they disdained to surrender. Only two or three were made 
prisoners, with about three hundred women and children. This battle crushed 
the power and spirit of the Creek nation, and soon afterward the chiefs of the 
remnant signified their submission. "^ It was a sad scene to the eyes of the 
benevolent and good, to see these ancient tribes of our land, who were then 
makino- rapid strides in the progress of civilization, so utterly ruined by the 
destroying hand of war. They found that might made i^ight, in the view of 
their subjugators, and they were compelled to make a treaty of peace upon the 
terms dictated by their conquerors. Thus, time after time since the advent of 
the white people here, have the hands of the stronger been laid upon the weaker, 
until now nothing but remnants of once powerful nations remain. 

The naval operations upon the ocean, during the year 1813, were very im- 
portant. Many and severe conflicts between public and private armed vessels 
of the United States and Great Britain, occurred ; and at the close of the year, 
the balance-sheet of victories showed a preponderance in favor of the former.* 
Toward the end of February, the United States sloop of war Hornet^ Cap- 

' Page 460. 

^ John Coffee was a native of Virginia. He did good semce during the second War for Inde- 
pendence, and in subsequent campaigns. He died in 1834. 

^ South side of Tallushatchee Creek, near the village of Jacksonville, in Benton county, Ala- 
bama. 

* A little east of the Coosa River, in the present Talladega county. 

^ On the bank of the Tallapoosa, twenty miles from its junction with the Coosa, in Macon 
county. 

^ On the west bank of the Tallapoosa, at the mouth of Emucfau Creek, in Tallapoosa county. 
' Called Tohopeka by the Indians. Near the north-east corner of Tallapoosa county. 

* Among those who bowed in submission was Weathersford, their greatest leader. He appeared 
suddenly before Jackson, in his tent, and standing erect, he said: "I am in your power; do with 
me what you please. I have done the white people all the harm I could. I have fought them, 
and fought them bravely. My warriors are all gone now, and I can do no more. When there was 
a chance for success, I never asked for peace. There is none now, and I ask it for the remnant of 
my nation." 

° More than seven hundred British vessels were taken by the American navy and privateer?«- 
during the years 1812 and 1813. 




1813.] THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 429 

tain Lawrence, fought [Feb. 24, 1813] the British brig Peacock, off the 
mouth of Demarara River, South America. The Peacock surrendered, after a 
fierce conflict of fifteen minutes, and a few moments afterAvard she sank, carry- 
ing down with her nine British seamen and three Americans. The loss of the 
Peacock, in killed and wounded, was thirty-seven ; of the Hornet only five. 
The generous conduct of Captain Lawrence, toward his enemy on this occasion, 
drew from the oflicers of the Peacock, on their arrival in New York, a public 
letter of thanks.' This, of itself, was a wreath of honor for the victor, more 
glorious than his triumph in the sanguinary conflict. 

On his return to the United States, Captain Lawrence was promoted to the 
command of the frigate Chesapeake ; and on the 1st 
of June, 1813, he sailed from Boston harbor, in search 
of the British frigate, Shannon, which had recently 
appeared off the New England coast, and challenged 
any vessel, of equal size, to meet her. Lawrence 
found the boaster the same day, about thirty miles 
from Boston light; and at five in the afternoon, a 
furious action began. The two vessels soon became 
entangled. Then the Britons boarded the Chesapeake, '^'^^< 
and after a desperate hand-to-hand struggle, hoisted ^-^i-^-^i-^' lawrence. 
the British flag. Lawrence was mortally wounded at the beginning of the 
action ; and when he was carried below, he uttered those brave words of com- 
mand, which Perry afterward displayed on his flag-ship on Lake Erie, " Don't 
give up the ship !'' The combat lasted only fifteen minutes ; but in that time, 
the Chesapeake had forty-eight killed and ninety-eight wounded ; the Shannon 
twenty-three killed, and fifty-six wounded. The body of Lawrence," with that 
.of Ludlow, the second in command, was carried to Halifax, in the victorious 
Shannon, and there buried with the honors of war. This event caused great 
sadness in America, and unbounded joy in England.' 

Another disaster followed the loss of the Chesapeake. It was the capture 
of the American brig Ai'ijus, Captain Allen, in August. The Aligns, in the 
spring [1813], had conveyed Mr. Crawford, United States minister, to France, 
and for two months had greatly annoyed British shipping in the English Chan- 

' They said, " So much was done to alleviate the uncomfortable and distressing situation in 
which we were placed, when received on board the ship you command, that we can not better 
«xpress our feelings than by saying, we ceased to consider ourselves prisoners; and everything 
that friendship could dictate, was adopted by you and the ofBcers of the Hornet, to remedy the 
inconvenience we otherwise should have experienced, from the unavoidable loss of the whole of 
our property and clothes, by the sudden smking of the Peacock." The crew of the Hornet divided 
their c'.olhing with the prisoners. 

" Captain James Lawrence was a native of New Jersey, and received a midshipman's warrant 
at the age of sixteen years. He was with Decatur at Tripoli [page 392]. He died four days after 
receiving the wound, at the age of thirty-one years. A beautiful monument, in the form of a trun- 
cated column and pedestal, was erected to his memory in Trinity churcn-yard. New York. This, in 
time became dilapidated, and, a few years ago. a new t.ne, ol another form, was erected near the 
south entrance to the church, a few feet from Broadwaj". 

^ A writer of the time observed: ''Never did any victory — not those ofWellington in Spain, 
nor even those of Nelson — call forth such expressions of joy on the part of the British; a proof 
tliat our naval character had risen somewhat in their estimation." 



430 'TH^' NATION. [1813. 

nel. Several vessels were sent out to capture her ; and on the 14th of August, 
the sloop of war' Pelican^ after a brief, but severe action, defeated i\\e Ai-gus. 
In less than a month afterward [Sept. 10 J, Perry gained his great victory on 
Lake Erie ;^ and the British brig Boxer, Captain Blythe, had surrendered 
[Sept. 5, 1813], to the United States brig Enterprise, Lieutenant Burrows, 
after an engagement of forty minutes, off the coast of Maine. Blythe and Bur- 
rows, young men of great promise, were both slain during the action, and their 
bodies were buried in one grave at Portland, with military honors. 

A distressing warfare upon the coast between Delaware Bay and Charleston, 
was carried on during the spring and summer of 1813, by a small British 
squadron under the general command of Admiral Cockburn. His chief object 
was to draw the American troops from the northern frontier to the defense of 
the seaboard, and thus lessen the danger that hung over Canada. It was a sort 
of amphibious warfare — on land and water — and was marked by many acts of 
unnecessary cruelty. The British had talked of "chastising the Americans 
into submission," and the method now employed was the instrument. On the 
4th of February, 1813, two ships of the line, three frigates, and other British 
vessels, made their appearance at the capes of Virginia.' At about the same 
time, another British squadron entered the Delaware River, destroyed the 
American shipping there in March, and in April cannonaded the town of 
Lewiston, In May, Frenchtown, Havre de Grace, Georgetown, and Frederick- 
town, on the Chesapeake, were plundered and burned ; and then the combined 
British fleet entered Hampton Roads/ and menaced Norfolk. While attempt- 
ing to go up to that city, the enemy were nobly repulsed [Jan. 22, 1813] by 
the Americans upon Craney Island,^ under the command of Major Faulkner, 
assisted by naval officers. The British then fell upon Hampton [Jan. 25] ; and 
having surfeited themselves with plunder, withdrew. Cock^Durn" sailed down 
the North Carolina coast, marauding whenever opportunity offered, and carried 
away a large number of negroes and sold them in the West Indies. In pleas- 
ant contrast to this, Avas the deportment of Commodore Hardy, whose squadron 
was employed during the same season, in blockading the New England coast. 
Although he landed upon our shores frequently, yet his conduct was always 
that of a high-minded gentleman and generous enemy.^ 

During the year 1813, the United States frigate Essex, Captain Porter, 
made a long and successful cruise in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. It oc- 
cupied the time from April until October. The Essex carried at her mast- 
head the popular motto, '■'■Free Trade and Sailor's Rights f' and, while in 

'Page 415. ^ Page 423. = Page 64. * Note 3, page 297. 

^ Craney Island is low and bare, and lies at the mouth of the Ehzabeth River, about five 
nules below Norfolk. At the time in question, there were some unfinished fortifications upon 
it. These were strengthened and added to by the insurgents during the late Civil "War. 

• Cockburn died in England in 1853, at an advanced age. 

' Congress had passed an act, offering a reward of half their value for the destruction of British 
ships, by other means than those of the armed vessels of tlie United States. Tliis was to encoura^ge 
the use of torpedoes. The cruel forays upon tlie soutliern coasts seemed to warrant this species 
of dishonorable warfare. It was employed against Hardy's squadron. He was justly indignanl| 
and protested against it as unmanly. 



1814.] THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 431 

the Pacific, she captured twelve British whale-ships, with an aggregate of 
three hundred and two men, and one hundred and seven guns. The Essex 
was finally captured in the harbor of Valparaiso [March, 
28, 1814J, on the western coast of South America, by 
the British frigate Phoehe^ and sloop of war Cherub, 
after one of the most desperately fought battles of the 
war. It is said that thousands of the inhabitants of 
Valparaiso covered the neighboring heights as spectators 
of the conflict. Perceiving the overpowering advantage 
of the British, their sympathies wei'e strongly elicited 
in favor of the Essex. When any thing in her favor 
appeared, loud shouts went up from the multitude ; and 
when she was finally disabled and lost, they expressed ^'^^^ iWi.ouL i'oi.ilk. 
their feelings in groans and tears. The Essex lost one hundred and fifty- 
four, in killed and wounded. Captain Porter' wrote to the Secretary of the 
Navy, " We have been unfortunate, but not disgraced." 




CHAPTER VI. 

SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE, CONTINUED. [1814, 1815.] 

During the year 1814, the war was prosecuted by both parties with more 
zeal and vigor than hitherto. The means for supporting it were much aug- 
mented by the government of the United States, notwithstanding the public 
credit was much depreciated, and treasury notes fell as low as seventeen per 
cent, below par. At the same time. Great Britain seemed to put forth increased 
energy, and her vessels of war hovered along our entire coast, and kept the sea- 
port towns in a state of continual alarm. Early in that year, the victorious 
career of Napoleon, in Europe, was checked by the allied powers. Almost all 
of the governments of continental Europe, with that of England, had combined 
to crush him, and sustain the sinking Bourbon dynasty. Their armies were 
allied in a common cause. These, approaching from different directions, reached 
Paris, at the close of March, 1814, when the Russian and Prussian emperors 
entered the city.^ Hoping to secure the crown to his son. Napoleon abdicated 
in his favor on the 4th of April, and retired to Elba. Peace for Europe 

' Commodore David Porter was among the most distinguished of the American naval com- 
manders. He was a resident minister of the United States in Turkey, and died, near Constantia- 
ople, in March, 1843. 

" Russians, one hundred and fifty thousand strong, advanced from Switzerland; Blucher led 
one hundred and thirty thousand Prussians from Germany ; Bemadotte, the old companion-in-arm3 
of Napoleon, was at the head of one hundred thousand Swedes, and marched through Holland ; and 
the English, in great power, advanced from Spain, under Wellington. A battle at Montmartre left 
1,'aris exposed to the enemy, and Alexander and Frederic took possession of the capital on the 31st 
of March. 




482 '^^ii^ NATION. [1814. 

seemed certain. British troops were withdrawn from the continent, and early 
in the summer of 1814, fourteen thousand of Wellington's veterans were sent 
to Canada' to operate against the United States. Considering the moral and 
material weakness of the American army, hitherto, the circumstance of the 
continual employment of the British troops on the continent, was highly favor- 
able to the United States. Had Europe been at peace, the result of this second 
War for Independence might have been quite different. 

The favorite project of the public authorities continued to be the invasion of 
Canada -^ and to oppose it, was the chief solicitude of the British oiScers on 
our northern frontiers. The principal force of the enemy in Upper Canada, 
was placed under the chief command of Lieutenant-General Drummond, late in 
the season ; while the American army on the Niagara 
^ - :^, frontier was commanded by General Brown, at the 

same time. General Wilkinson was still in the 
vicinity of the St. Lawrence, and toward the close of 
February, he broke up his camp at French Mills, ^ and 
retired to Plattsburg : while General Brown, with two 
thousand men, marched to Sacketts Harbor, prepara- 
tory to his departure for the Niagara. Late in March, 
Wilkinson proceeded to erect a battery at Rouse's 
Point, at the foot of Lake Champlain; and at La 
GEM,ii\i> ];i;o\vx. Colle, three miles below, he had an unsuccessful 

engagement [March 30] with the British. The disas- 
trous result of this affair brought Wilkinson into disrepute, and he was tried by 
a court-martial, but acquitted of all charges alleged against him. He had been 
suspended from all command, in the mean Avhile, and the charge of the troops 
was given to General Izard. 

Preparations had been making on Lake Ontario, during the winter and 
spring, by both parties, to secure the control of that inland sea. Sir James 
Yeo was in command of a small British squadron, and on the 5th of May 
[1814], he appeared before Oswego, accompanied by about three thousand land 
troops and marines.^ Oswego was then defended by only about three hundred 
troops under Colonel Mitchell, and a small flotilla under Captain Woolsey. 
The chief object of the expedition was to capture or destroy a large quantity of 
naval and military stores, deposited at Oswego Falls, ^ but the gallant band of 
Americans at the harbor defeated the project. They withstood an attack, by 
land and water, for almost two days, before they yielded to a superior force. 
Afraid to penetrate the country toward the Falls, in the face of such deter- 
mined opponents, the British withdrew on the morning of the 7th [May, 1814], 

' These were embarked at Bourdeaux, in France, and sailed directly for the St. Lavsrence^ 
without even touching the shores of England. 

' Page 410. ' Page 427. 

* The fort on the east side of the river was then in quite a dilapidated state, and formed but a 
feeble defense for the troops. It was strengthened after this attack. 

" At the present village of Fulton, on the east side of Oswego River, and about twelve miiea 
firom the harbor. 



1815.] THE SECOND WAR lOR INDEPENDENCE. 433 

after losing two hundred and thirty-five men, in killed and wounded. The 
Americans lost sixty-nine. 

Toward the close of June, General Brown marched from Sackett's Harbor' 
to the Niagara frontier ; and on the morning of the 3d of July, Generals Scott 
and Ripley' crossed the river, with a considerable force, and captured Fort 
Erie, which was situated on the Canada side of the Niagara River, nearly 
opposite Black Rock. The garrison withdrew to the intrenched camp of the 
British General Riall, then at Chippewa,' a few miles below. On the morning 
of the 4th [July, 1814], Brown advanced, and on the 5th the two armies had a 
ganguinary battle in the open fields at Chippewa. The British were repulsed, 
with a losa of about five hundred men, and retreated to Burlington Heights,* 
where thty were reinforced by troops under General Drummond, who assumed 
the chief command in person. The Americans lost a little more than three 
hundred. 

General Drummond was mortified by this discomfiture of his veteran troops 
by what he considered raw Americans, and he resolved to wipe out the stain. 
Collecting every regiment from Burlington and York, with some from Kingston 
and Prescott, he prepared for a renewal of combat. With a force about one 
third greater than that of Brown,' he immediately advanced to meet the Amer 
icans. The latter had encamped at Bridgewater, near Niagara Falls ; and 
there, at the close of a sultry day, and within the sound of the great cataract's 
thunder, one of the most destructive battles of the war began.* It commenced 
at sunset and ended at midnight [July 25, 1814], when the Americans had 
lost eight hundred and fifty-eight men in killed and wounded, and the British 
twenty more than that. The Americans were left in quiet possession of the 
field, but were unable to carry away the heavy artillery which they had cap- 
tured.' Brown and Scott being wounded, * the command devolved on Ripley, 
and the following day [July 26] he withdrew to Fort Erie, where General 
Gaines,^ a senior officer, who arrived soon afterward, assumed the chief com- 
mand. 

Having recovered from his wound, Drummond again advanced, with five 

' Page 432. 

^ The late "Winfield Scott was Lieutenant -General^ and commander-in-chief of the army of the 
United States, in 1861, when he retired from the service. General James Ripley remained in 
the army after the war, and died on the 'id of March, 1839. 

' On the Canada shore, about two miles aliove Niagara Falls. ■• Page 425. 

^ Jacob Brown was born in Pennsylvania, in 1775. He engaged in his country's service in 
1813, and soon became distinguished. He was made Major-General in 1814. He was General- 
in-chief of the United States army in 1821, and held that rank and office when he died, in 1828. 

• The hottest of the fight was in and near an obscure road known as Lundy's Lane. This battle 
is known by tlie respective names of Bridgewater, Lundy's Lane, and Niagara Falls. 

' After the Americans had withdrawn, a party of the British returned and carried off their 
artillery. This event was so magnified, in the English accounts of the battle, as to make the victory 
to appear on the side of the British. ; 

^ The British Generals Drummond and Riall were also wounded. General Scott led the advance 
in the engagement, and for an hour maintained a most desperate conflict, when he was reinforced. 
It was quite dark, and General Riall and his suite were made prisoners by the gallant Major Jesup. 
A British battery upon an eminence did terrible execution, for it swept the whole field. This was 
assailed and captured by a party under Colonel Miller, who replied, when asked by General Brown 
if he could accomplish it, "I'll try, sir." Three times the British attempted to recapture this bat- 
tery. In the last attempt, Drummond was wounded. * Page 398. 

28 




NIAGARA FRONTIER. 



434 THE XATIO:n'. I [1814 

thousand men, and on the 4th of August appeared before Fort Erie, and com- 
menced preparations for a siege. From the 7th until the 
14th, there was an almost incessant cannonade between 
the besiegers and the besieged. On the 15th, Drummond 
made a furious assault, but was repulsed, with a loss of 
almost a thousand men. Very little was done by either 
party for nearly a month after this affair, when General 
Brown, who had assumed command again, ordered a sor- 
tie [Sept. 17] from the fort. It was successful ; and the 
Americans pressed forward, destroyed t^ advanced Avorks 
of the besiegers, and drove them toward Chippewa. In- 
formed, soon afterward, that General Izard was approach- 
ing,' with reinforcements for Brown, Drummond retired 
to Fort George.'' The Americans abandoned and destroyed Fort Erie in No- 
vember [November 5], and, crossing the river, went into winter-quarters at 
Buffalo, Black Rock, and Batavia. 

Let us consider the military operations in northern New York, for a mo- 
ment. Very little of interest transpired in the vicinity of Lake Champlain 
until toward the close of summer, when General Izard' marched [August, 
1814] from Plattsburg, with five thousand men, to reinforce General Brown on 
the Niagara frontier, leaving General Macomb* in command, with only fifteen 
hundred men. Taking advantage of this circumstance. General Prevost, who 
led an army of fourteen thousand men, chiefly Wellington's veterans, to the 
invasion of the United States, marched for Plattsburg. During the spring and 
summer, the British and Americans had each constructed a small fleet on Lake 
Champlain, and those were now ready for operations ; the former under Com- 
modore Downie, and the latter under Commodore Macdonough.' 

General Prevost arrived near Plattsburg on the 6th of September, when 

• Note 3, page 427. ' Page 425. 

^ George Izard was born in Souih Carolina, in 17 It, and made military life his profession. 
After the war he left the army. He was governor of Arkansas Territory in 1825, and died at 
Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1828. 

' Alexander Macomb was born in tJie fort in Detroit, in 1782, and entered the army at the age 
of seventeen years. He was made a brigadier in 1814. In 1835, he was General-in-chief of the 
armies of the United States, and died in 1841. , . ■, ^ c * *v, 

^ Thomas Macdonough was a native of Delaware. He was twenty-eight years of age at the 
time of the engagement at Plattsburg. The State of New York gave him one thousand acres of 
and on Plattsburg Bay, for his services. He died in 1825, at the age of thirty-nine years. Mac- 
donough was always remarkable for cool courage. On one occasK)n, while first lieutenant of a 
vessellying in the harbor of Gibraltar, an armed boat from a British man-of-war boarded an Amer- 
ican brig anchored near, in the absence of . ■ c 
401. Macdonough manned a gig, and with an inferior lorce. 



ican 
401. 
seaman 



brii anchored near, in the absence of the commander, and carried off a s^^^^^^^- .Sf^ P^g^ 
>7-donouo-h manned a gi^, and with an inferior force, made chase and recaptured the 
Tlie cantain of the man-of-war came aboard Macdonough's vessel, and, m a great rage, 
;;ked him how he dared to take the man from his majesty's boat, "^e was an American s^^^^^^^^ 
and I did my dutv," was the reply. "I'll bring my ship alongside, and smk you, angrly cried 
Hie Biln "^^ That you can do." coolly responded Macdonough ; "but while she swims, that man 
vnu will not have" The captain, roaring with rage, said, "Supposing / had been in the boat, 
^uld you h rdareJto clmit'such aS act?" "I should have made tlie f «-?*-. -^^J-the 
calm replv. " What 1" shouted the captain, " if I were to impress men from that bng, would you 
interfere?" "You have only to try it, sir," was Macdonougn's tantalizmg reply. The haughty 
Briton was over-matched, and he did not attempt to try the metal of such a brave young mai. 
There were cannon-balls in his coolness, fiall of danger. 



•1815.] 



THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 



435 



Macomb's little army, and quite a large body of militia under Greiieral Mooers, 
retired to the south side of the Saranac, and prepared to dispute its passage by 
the invaders. On the morning of the 11th, the British fleet came around 
Cumberland Head, with a fair wind, and attacked Macdonough's squadron in 
Plattsburg Bay.* At the same time, the British land troops opened a heavy j 
cannonade upon the Americans. After a severe engagement of two hours and 




twenty minutes, Macdonough became victor, and the Avhole British fleet was 
surrendered to him.^ * The land forces fought until dark, and every attempt of 
the British to cross the Saranac Avas bravely resisted. During the evening, 
Prevost hastily retreated, leaving his sick and wounded, and a large quantity 
of military stores, behind him. The British loss, in killed, wounded, and de- 
serted, from the 6th to the 11th, was about twenty-five hundred ; that of the 
Americans, only one hundred and twenty-one. The victory was applauded with 
the greatest enthusiasm throughout the land, and gave emphasis to the effect 
of another at Baltimore, which had been recently achieved. 

' "When the British squadron appeared off Cumberland TTead, ilacdonough knelt on the deck of 
the Saratoga (his flag-ship), in the midst of his men. and prayed to the God of Battles for aid. A 
curious incident occurred during the engagement that soon followed. A British ball demolished a 
hen-coop on board the Saratoga. A cock, released from his prison, flew into the rigging, and 
crowed lustily, at the same time flapping his wings with triumpliant vehemence. The seamen r©- 
. garded the event as a good omen, and they fought like tigers, while the cock cheered them on with 
Ms crowinga, until the British flag was struck and the firing ceased. 

' The Americans lost, in killed and wounded, one hundred and sixteen ; the British, one hu«- 
jdred and ninety-four. Among them was Commodore Downie, whose remains lie under a monu. 
ment in a cemetery at Plattsburg, with those of several of his comrades. 



486 THE XATION. [1814 

So wide was the theater of war, that in our rapid view of it, the shifting, 
scenes carry us alternately from the northern frontier to the western and south- 
ern borders, and then upon the Atlantic and its coasts. The latter were expe- 
riencing much trouble, while the whole frontier from the Niagara to the St. 
Lawrence was in commotion. The principal ports from New York to Maine 
were blockaded by British war- vessels ; and early in the spring, a depredating 
warfare again' commenced on the shores of the Chesapeake. These were but 
feebly defended by a small flotilla," under the veteran. Commodore Barney;' and 
when, about the middle of August, a British squadron, of almost sixty sail, 
arrived in the bay, with six thousand troops, under General Ross, destined for 
the capture of Washington city, it proved of little value. Ross landed [Aug. 
19, 1814] at Benedict, on the Patuxent (about twenty-five miles from ita 
mouth), Avith five thousand men, and marched toward Washington city.^ Bar- 
ney's flotilla, lying higher up the stream, was abandoned and burned, and hia 
marines joined the gathering land forces, under General Winder. Ross was 
one of Wellington's most active commanders, and Winder had only three thou- 
sand troops to oppose him, one half of whom were undisciplined militia. A 
sharp engagement took place [Aug. 24] at Bladensburg,' a few miles from 
Washington city, when the militia fled, and Barney, fighting gallantly at the 
head of his seamen and marines, was made prisoner.* Ross pushed forward to 
Washington city the same day, burned the capitol, President's house, and 
other public and private buildings [August 24], and then hastily retreated 
[August 25] to his shipping.'' 

The British ministry were greatly elated by the destruction of the public 
buildings and property at Washington, but their jubilant feelings were not 
shared by the best of the English people at large. The act was denounced, in 
severe terms, on the floor of the British House of Commons ; and throughout 
civilized Europe, it was considered a disgrace to the perpetrators and abettors. 
General Ross, however, seemed to glory in it as heartily as did the marauder, 
Cockburn ; and, flushed with success, he proceeded to attack Baltimore, where 
the veteran. General Smith, » was in command. That officer, in connection with 

^ Page 430. 

^ It consisted of a cutter (a vessel with one mast), two gun-boats [page 401], and nine barges, 
or boats propelled by oars. . 

^ He was born in Baltimore in 1759. He entered the naval service of the Eevolution in 1775, 
and was active during the whole war. He bore the American flag to the French National Con- 
vention in 1796, and, entered the French service. He returned to America in 1800, took part in 
the War of 1812, and died at Pittsburg m 1818. 

* Another small squadren was sent up the Potomac, but effected little else than plunder. 
» Note 1, page 392. 

* Until the latest moment, it was not known whether "Washington or Baltimore was to be at- 
tacked. Winder's troops, employed for the defense of both cities, were divided. The loss of the 
British, in kiUed, wounded, and by desertion, was almost a thousand men ; that of the Americans 
was about a hundred killed and wounded, and a hundred and twenty taken prisoners. The Pres- 
ident and his Cabinet were at Bladensburg when the British approached, but returned to the city 
when the conflict began, and narrowly escaped capture. 

■' Washington then contained about nine hundred houses, scattered, in groups, over a surface 
of three miles. The Great Bridge across the Potomac was also burnt. The Hght of the conflagra- 
tion was distinctly seen at Baltimore, forty miles distant. 

^ Samuel Smith, the brave commander of Fort Mifflin [page 275] in 1777. He was bom in- 



1815.] THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 437 

(jeneral Strieker, rallied the militia of the city and vicinity, and soon almost fif- 
teen thousand men were under arms, to defend the town. Ross landed [Sept. 12, 
1814], with almost eight thousand troops, at North Point, fourteen miles from 
the city, while a portion of the fleet went up the Patapsco to bombard Fort 
M 'Henry. He immediately pressed forward, but Avas soon met by the advanced 
corps of General Strieker, and a slight skirmish ensued. Ross was killed, and 
the command devolved on Colonel Brooke, who continued to advance. A severe 
battle now commenced, which continued an hour and a quarter, when the 
Americans fell back, in good order, toward the city. In this engagement the 
British lost about three hundred men ; the Americans, one hundred and sixty- 
three. Both parties slept on their arms that night ; and the following morn- 
ing [Sept. 13], the British advanced, as if to attack the city. The fleet, in the 
mean while, had opened its bombs and cannons upon the fort, whose garrison, 
under Major Armistead, made a most gallant defense. The bombardment con- 
tinued most of the day and night, and no less than fifteen hundred bombshells 
were thrown. The people in the city felt in immediate danger of an attack 
from the land troops ; but toward tlie morning of the 14th, these silently em- 
barked, and the disheartened and discomfited enemy withdrew.' This defense 
was bailed as an important victory.* 

The whole Atlantic coast, eastward from Sandy Hook,' was greatly annoyed 
by small British squadrons, during the summer of 1814. These captured 
many American coasting vessels, and sometimes menaced towns with bombard- 
ment. Finally, in August, Commodore Hardy' appeared before Stonington, 
and opened a terrible storm of bombshells and rockets'* upon the town. The 
attack continued four successive days [August 9-12], and several times land 
forces attempted to debark, but were always driven back by the militia. The 
object of this unprovoked attack seems to have been, to entice the American 
forces from New London, so that British shipping might go up the Thames, 
and destroy some American frigates, then near Norwich. The expedient sig- 
nally failed, and no further attempt of a similar kind was made on the Connecti- 
cut coast. 

Further eastward, that part of Maine which lies between the Penobscot 
River and Passamaquoddy Bay, became a scene of stirring events. On the first 

Pennsylvania in 1752 ; entered the revolutionary army in 1776 ; afterward represented Baltimore 
in Congress many years; and died in April, 1839. 

' General Smith estimated the entire loss of the British, in their attack upon Baltimore, at 
" between sis and seven hundred." 

^ An event, connected with this attack on Baltimore, was the origin of the stirring song, The 
■Star-Spangled Banner, which was written by Francis S. Key, of Georgetown, to the air of 
" Anacreon iu Heaven." With another gentleman, Key went, with a flag of truce, to attempt 
the release of a friend on board the British fleet. They were not allowed to return, lest they 
should disclose thS intended attack on tlie city. From a British vessel they saw the bom- 
bardment of Fort McHenry. They watched the American flag over the fort, all day, with great 
anxiety, until the darkness of the night hid it from view. With eager eyes, they looked in that 
direction at dawn, and, to their great joy, they saw tlie star-spangkd banner yet waving over 
the ramparts. It inspired the poet. '' Page 289. ^ Page 430. 

* Rockets used for setting fire to towns and shipping, are made similar to the common " sky- 
rockets," but filled with inflammable substances, which are scattered over buildings and the 
rigging of ships. 



438 TIIK XATIOxV. [1814. 

of September [1814], the governor of Nova Scotia and Admiral Griffith 
entered the Penobscot River, seized the town of Castine, and, bj proclamation^ 
took possession of the country, then inhabited bj about thirty thousand people. 
A few days afterward, the United States frigate John Adams entered the 
Penobscot after a successful cruise, and ran upon the rocks. While having 
her injuries repaired, she was attacked by several of the British sailing vessels 
and barges, manned by about a thousand men. Finding resistance to be vain, 
Captain Morris, her commander, fired her magazine, and blew her up. 

Difficulties again appeared in the south-west. We have already considered 
Jackson's successful warfare upon the Creek Indians.' In the course of the 
summer of 1814, he wrung from them a treaty, which completed their downfall, 
as a nation, and the war at the South was considered ended. They agreed tO' 
surrender a large portion of their beautiful and fertile country, as indemnity 
for the expenses of the war ; to allow the United States to make roads through 
the remainder ; and also not to hold intercourse with any British or Spanish 
posts. But the common enemy, favored by the Spaniards at Pensacola, soon 
appeared, and the Creeks again lifted their heads ir. hope, for a moment. A 
British squadron, cruising in the Gulf of Mexico, took possession of the forts, 
at Pensacola, by permission of the Spanish authorities, and there fitted out an 
expedition against Fort Bower (now Fort Morgan), at the entrance to Mobile 
Bay,^ then commanded by Major Lawrence. General Jackson then had his 
head-quarters at Mobile. The enemy appeared off Mobile Point on the 15th 
of September, and commenced the attack, by land and water, at about four 
o'clock in the afternoon. Fort Bower was garrisoned by resolute men, and was 
armed with twenty pieces of cannon. Lawrence and his little band made a 
gallant defense ; and soon the British were repulsed, with the loss of a ship 
of war and many men. Among the British land troops on the occasion, were- 
two hundred Creek warriors. 

Jackson, now a Major-General in the army, and commander of the south- 
western military district, assuming all the authority he was entitled to, held. 
the Spanish governor of Florida responsible for the act of giving shelter to the 
enemies of the United States. Failing to obtain any satisfactory guaranty for 
the future, he marched from Mobile with about two thousand Tennessee militia 
and some Choctaw warriors, against Pensacola. On the 7th of November 
[1814J he stormed the town, drove the British to their shipping, and finally 
from the harbor, and made the governor beg for mercy, and surrender Pensa- 
cola and all its military works, unconditionally. The British fleet disappeared 
the next day [November 8], and the victor retraced his steps [November 9]. 
His return was timely, for he was needed where extreme danger was menacing 
the whole southern country. On his arrival at Mobile, he found messages from 
New Orleans, begging his immediate march thither, for the British in the Gulf 
of Mexico., reinforced by thousands of troops from England, were about to. 
invade Louisiana. Jackson instantly obeyed the summons, and arrived there 

' Page 427. " On the east side, about thirty miles south from Mobile. 



1815.] THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 439 

on the 2d of December. He found the people of New Orleans in the greatest 
alarm, but his presence soon restored quiet and confidence. By vigorous, and 
even rigorous measures (for he declared martial law),' he soon placed the city 
in a state of comparative security," and when the British squadron, bearing 
General Packenham and about twelve thousand troops, many of them Welling- 
ton's veterans, entered Lake Borgne, he felt confident of success, even against 
such fearful odds. 

On the 14th of December, a British fleet of barges, about forty in number, 
and conveying twelve hundred men, captured a flotilla of five American gun- 
boats, in Lake Borgne, which Avere under the command of Lieutenant (late Com' 
modore) Thomas Ap Catesby Jones. In the engagement the Americans lost, 
in killed and wounded, about forty ; the British loss was about three hundred. 
The destruction of these gun-boats gave the enemy power to choose his point of 
attack ; and eight days afterward [Dec. 22], about twenty-four hundred of the 
British, under General Keane, reached the Mississippi, nine miles below New 
Orleans. An American detachment, led by Jackson in person, fell upon their 
camp the following night [Dec. 23, 1814], but withdrew to a stronger position, 
after killing or wounding four hundred of the British. The Americans lost 
about one hundred. 

And now preparations were instantly made for the great battle which soon 
afterward ensued. Jackson concentrated his troops (about three thousand in 
number, and mostly militia) within a line of intrenchments^ cast up four miles 
below the city of New Orleans, where they were twice cannonaded by the Brit- 
ish, but without much eflect. Finally, on the morning of the 8th of January, 
1815, General Packenham, the Brit- 




BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS. 



ish commander-in-chief, advanced with 
his whole force, numbering more than 
twelve thousand men, to make a gen- 
eral assault. Having been reinforced 
by about three thousand militia (chief- 
ly Kentuckians), Jackson now had 
six thousand expert marksmen con- 
cealed behind his intrenchments, or 
stationed at the batteries on his ex- 
tended line. A deep and ominous 
silence prevailed behind these defenses, until the British had approached within 
reach of the batteries, when the Americans opened a terrible cannonade. Yet 
the enemy continued to advance until within range of the American muskets 
and rifles. Volley after volley then poured a deadly storm of lead upon the 

• Note 8, page 170. 

' All the inlets, or bayous, were obstructed, and the banks of the Mississippi were so fortified 
as to prevent the ascent of vessels. A battery was erected on Chef Menteur, at the entrance to 
Lake Pontchartrain. 

* These intrenchments were a mile in length, extending from the river so far into the swamp, 
as to be impassable at the extremity. Along this line were eight distinct batteries, with heavy- 
cannons; and on the opposite side of the river was a battery with fifteen cannons. 



440 



THE :n'ation. 



[18U. 



invaders. The British column soon wavered ; General Packenham fell in front 
of his troops, with not less than a thousand dead and wounded lying around 
him ; and, utterly amazed by the terrible fire of the Americans, the entire 
army fled in confusion, leaving seven hundred dead, and more than a thousand 
wounded, on the field. The fugitives hastened to their encampment [Jan. 9], 




^^^■^..c -^ ^^ 4^c,^:/c 



CtT^kJ^ 



and finally to their ships [Jan, 18], and escaped." The Americans were so 
safely intrenched, that they lost only seveii killed and six wounded, in this 
victorious battle. It was the crowning victory," and last land battle of moment, 
of the Second War for Independence.' 

While the victory of the Americans at Ncav Orleans saved that city from 
plunder and destruction,-' and the whole Southern country from invasion, the 



^ Wliile thei?e operations were in pros^ress on the ilississippi, the British fleet had not been in- 
active. Some vessels bombarded Fort St. Philip, below New Orleans, on the 11th of January, and 
continued the attack for eight daj-s without success. In the mean while, Admhal Cockburn [page 
430] was pursuing his detestable warfare along the Carolina and Georgia coasts, menacing Charles- 
ton and Savannah with destruction, and landing at obscure points to plunder the inhabitants. 

^ During 1814, the war continued on the ocean, yet there were no battles of great importance. 
Tlie Pearorh captured the British brig Epervier, on the 29th of April, off the coast of Florida. The 
Wasp, Captain Blakely, also made a successful cruise, but after capturing her thirteenth prize, dis- 
appeared, and was never heard of again. Probably lost in a storm. The President, Commodore 
Decatur, was captured off Long Island, on the 16th"of January, 1815; and on the 20th of February 
following, the Constitution, Commodore Stewart, had a severe action with the British frigate Cyane, 
and sloop-of-war Levant, and captured both. Soon after this, the British brig Penguin was captured, 
but the proclamation of peace had then ended the war. ^ Page 409. 

* It is asserted, upon good authority, that Packenham's watchword, as he led his troops toward 
the city, was "Booty and Beauty," thereby indicating that plunder and ravishment should be the 
soldiers' reward ! We can hardly believe Sir Edward really contemplated such barbarity. 



1815.] THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 443 

brave Jackson, whose skill and prowess had been chiefly instrumental in pro- 
ducing that result, was mercilessly assailed by some persons in official station, 
who could not appreciate his pure motives and sturdy patriotism. Perceiving 
the necessity of prompt and vigorous action, Jackson had taken all power into 
his hands, on his arrival at New Orleans, and declared martial law.' Governor 
Claiborne^ wisely and generously seconded the measure, and surrendering all 
authority into the hands of General Jackson, led a large body of the militia of 
his State to the field. Three days after the battle, the news of peace arrived; 
and Judge Hall immediately ordered the arrest of Jackson, on a charge of con- 
tempt of court.' He was tried; and the judge fined him a thousand dollars. 
The people hissed the official ; bore the brave general upon their shoulders from 
the court-room to the street, and then the immense crowd sent up a shout, such 
as went over the land with emphasis thirteen years later, when he was a candi- 
date for the Chief Magistracy of the nation^ — "Hurrah for Jackson !" The 
blow aimed at him recoiled with fearful force upon his persecutors. 

The country was made vocal with rejoicings on account of the victory 
at New Orleans ; and Congress honored General Jackson with thanks and a 
gold medal. A little more than a month after the battle, a proclamation by 
the President [Feb. 18, 1815], that peace had been secured by treaty, spread a 
smile of tranquillity and happiness over the whole Union. ^ For more than a 
year, efforts toward that end had been put forth. As early as December, 1813, 
the British government had sent overtures of peace to that of the United 
States. They were forwarded by the British schooner Bramble, Avhich arrived 
at Annapolis, in Maryland, on the 1st of January, 1814, bearing a flag of 
truce. The President at once informed Congress of the fact, and immedi- 
ate action was had. The overtures were promptly met, in a conciliatory 
spirit, by the government of the United States, and commissioners were ap- 
pointed by the two powers to negotiate a treaty." For a long time the Amer- 
ican commissioners were treated Avith neglect by the British government. They 

* Note 8, page 170. 

' William C. C. Claiborne was bom in Virginia in 1775, and was educated at William and Mary 
College. He became an assistant clerk of the National House of Representatives at the age of six- 
teen years ; and at the age of twenty-nine, President Jefferson appointed him governor of the 
Louisiana Territory. He had already become conspicuous as a lawyer in the West ; and at the age 
of twency-two he was a judge of the Supreme Court of Tennessee. He was elected to Congress the 
following year, and was a distinguished man in that body. He was elected governor of Louisiana 
•when it became a State in 1812, and was acting in that capacity when the British menaced New 
Orleans. He left that ofiQce in 1817, when he was elected to the United States Senate. But his 
death was near, and he never entered that assembly. He died in November, 1817, in the forty- 
second year of his age. 

' A member of the Louisiana Legislature assailed Jackson by a newspaper publication. Jack- 
son ordered his arrest. Judge Hall granted a writ of habeas corpus. Jackson, in the proper exer- 
cise 'of his power under martial law, not only refused obedience to the mandates of the writ, but 
arrested the judge, and sent him out of the city. For this " contempt of court" Jackson himself 
was arrested. His noble defense was written by Edward Livingston. ■* Page 459. 

* As we have observed, intelligence of the signing of the treaty reached New Orleans three 
days after the battle. It was not formally proclaimed until more than a month afterward. 

^ The United States commissioners were John Qnincy Adams, James A. Bayard. Henry Clay. 
John Russel, and Albert Gallatin. Those of Great Britain were Admiral Lord Gambler, Henry 
Goulbourn, and William Adams. These commissioners are all dead. Mr. Clay, who died in 1852- 
•was the last survivor. 



444 THE NATION. [1814. 

■were suffered to remain in England unnoticed, for months, and then the ministry, 
proposing first one place, and then another, for the negotiations, exhibited a trifling 
spirit, derogatory to true dignity. For half a year the treaty Avas prolonged 
in this way, until, finally, the commissioners of the two governments met in the 
city of Ghent, in Belgium, in the month of August, 1814. On the 24th of 
December following, a treaty was signed, which both governments speedily 
ratified. It stipulated a mutual restoration of all places and possessions taken 
during the war, or which might be taken after signing the treaty ; declared that 
■aW captures at sea should be relinquished, if made within specified times there- 
after, in different parts of the world ; and that each party should mutually put 
a stop to Indian hostilities, and endeavor to extinguish the traffic in slaves. 
The boundaries, imperfectly adjusted by the treaty of 1783,' were all settled; 
l)ut the subject of impressment of seamen, which was the chief cause of the war," 
of paper blockades,' and orders in council," were all passed by without specific 
notice, in the treaty. With this treaty ended the war, which had been in prog- 
ress for two years and eight months ; and the proclamation of the fact was an 
occasion of the most sincere rejoicing throughout the United States and Great 
Britain, for it was an unnatural contest — a conflict between brethren of the 
same blood, the same religion, the same laws, and the same literature. 

During these negotiations, the war, as we have seen, was vigorously prose- 
cuted, and the opposition of the Federalists grew more intense.' It reached its 
culmination in December, when delegates, appointed by several New England 
Legislatures, ° met [Dec. 15, 1814] in convention at Hartford, for the purposes 
of considering the grievances of the people, caused by a state of war, and to de- 
vise speed V measures for its termination.^ This convention, whose sessions were 
secret, was denounced as treasonable by the administration party ; but patriot- 
ism appears to have prevailed in its councils, Avhatever may have been the de- 
signs of some. Its plans for disunion or secession, if any were formed, were 
rendered abortive soon after its adjournment, by the proclamation of peace, fol- 
lowed by the appointment of a day for national thanksgiving to the Almighty 
for the blessed event. That day was observed throughout the Union. 

The short time which remained of the session of Congress, after the proclam- 
ation of peace, was occupied by that body in adapting the affairs of the govern- 
ment to the new condition of things. The army was reduced to a peace ostab- 
ment of ten thousand men, and various acts, necessary for the public good 
during a state of war, were repealed. The navjtl establishment, however, was 
kept up ; and the depredations of Algerine cruisers caused Congress to author- 

' Page 348. " Note 5, page 409. 

* A port being blockaded by proclamation, without ships of war being there to maintain it. 
This practice is no longer in vogue. * Note 1, page 400. ^ Page 410. 

^ New Hampshire and Vermont were unrepresented, except by three county delegates. The 
Federalists in Vermont, especially, were now in a weak majority; and Governor Oilman, of New 
Hampshire, the members of whose council were Democratic, could not call a meeting of the Legis- 
lature to appoint delegates. 

' George Cabot was appointed President of the Convention, and Theodore Dwight, a former 
member of Congress from Connecticut, and then editor of the Hartford Union, was its secretary. 
The Convention was composed of twenty-six members. 



1815.] THE SECOND WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE. 445 

ize the President to send a squadron to the Mediterranean Sea. The results of 
the war, though apparently disastrous to all concerned at the time, were seen, 
subsequently, to have been highly beneficial to the United States, not so much 
in a material as in a moral aspect. The total cost of the war to the United 
States was about one hundred millions of dollars, and the loss of lives, by bat- 
tles and other casualties incident to the war, has been estimated at thirty thou- 
sand persons. The cost of blood and treasure to the British nation was much 
greater. During the war, the Americans captured, on the ocean and on the 
lakes, fifty-six British vessels of war, mounting 886 cannons ; and 2,360 mer- 
chant vessels, mounting 8,000 guns. There were also lost on the American 
coast, during the war, by wreck or otherwise, twenty-nine British ships of war, 
mounting about 800 guns. The Americans lost only twenty-five vessels of war, 
and a much less number of merchant-ships than the British.* 

The clouds of an almost three years' war had scarcely disappeared from the 
firmament, when others suddenly arose. The contest with England had but 
just ended, when the United States were compelled to engage in a brief 

WAR WITH ALGIERS. 

As we have observed,'' the United States had paid tribute to Algiers since 
1795. Every year, as his strength increased, the ruler of that Barbary State 
became more insolent,* and, finally, believing that the United States navy had 
been almost annihilated by the British in the late contest, he made a pretense 
for renewing depredations upon American commerce, in violation of the treaty. 
The American government determined to pay tribute no longer, accepted the 
challenge, and in May, 1815, Commodore Decatur^ proceeded with a squadron 
to the Mediterranean, to humble the pirate. Fortunately, the Algerine fleet 
was cruising in the Mediterranean, in search of American vessels. On the 17th 
of June [1815], Decatur met and captured the flag-ship (a frigate) of the Al- 
gerine admiral, and another vessel with almost six hundred men, and then sailed 
for the Bay of Algiers, He immediately demanded [June 28] the instant sur- 
render of all American prisoners, full indemnification for all property destroyed, 
and absolute relinquishment of all claims to tribute from the United States, in 
future. Informed of the fate of a part of his fleet, the Dey' yielded to the 
humiliating terms, and signed a treaty [June 80] to that effect. Decatur then 
sailed for Tunis, and demanded and received [July, 1815] from the bashaw, 
forty-six thousand dollars, in payment for American vessels which he had 
allowed the English to capture in his harbor. The same demand, on the same 
account, w^as made upon the bashaw of Tripoli," and Decatur received [August] 
twenty-five thousand dollars from him and the restoration of prisoners. This 
cruise in the Mediterranean gave full security to American commerce in those 



' For details, see Lossing's Pictorial Field-Book of the War o/1812. 

^ Page 381. 

^ Page 381. In 1812, .the Dey compelled Mr. Lear, the American consul [page 395], to pay 
him §27,000 for the safety of himself, family, and a few Americans, under the penalty of .-^11 
being made slaves. ^ Page 392. ' Note 3, page 392. " Page 392. 



446 THE NATION. [1817. 

seas, and greatly elevated the character of the government of the United States 
in the opinion of Europe. Now was accomplished, during a single cruise, what 
the combined powers of Europe dared not to attempt. 

Now the eventful administration of Mr. Madison drew to a close, and very 
little of general interest occurred, except the chartering of a new United States 
Bank,' with a capital of $35,000,000, to continue twenty years ; and the admis- 
sion of Indiana [December, 1816] into the union of States. On the 16th of 
March, 1816, a caucus of Democratic members of Congress, nominated James 
Monroe of Virginia (who had been Madison's Secretary of War for a few months), 
for President of the United States, and Daniel D. Tompkins' of New York, 
for Vice-President. The Federalists, whose power, as a party, was now 
rapidly passing away, nominated Rufus King' for President, and votes were 
given to several persons for Vice-President. Monroe and Tompkins were elected 
by large majorities. Mr. Monroe's election was by an almost unanimous vote 
of the electoral college.^ Only one (in New Hampshire) was cast against him. 



CHAPTER VII. 

MONROE'S ADMINISTRATION. [1817—1825]. 

On the 4th of March, 1817, James Monroe,' the fifth President of the 
United States, was inaugurated at Washington City. The oath of office was 
administered by Chief Justice Marshall," in the presence of Mr. Madison, the 
judges of the Supreme Court, and a large congregation of citizens. His address 
on that occasion was liberal and temperate in its tone, and gave general satis- 
faction to the people. The commencement of his administration was hailed as 
the dawn of an era of good feeling and national prosperity.' He selected his 
cabinet from the Republican party, and never since the formation of the gov- 

' Page 372. 

^ Daniel D. Tompkins was born in 1774. He was a prominent Democrat when Jefferson was 
elected [page 389] President of the United States. He was chief justice of New York and also 
Governor of the State. He died on Staten Island, m 1825. 

3 Page 395. * Note 1, page 361. 

^ J^mes Monroe was bom in Westmoreland county, Yirginia, in April, 1759. He was edu- 
cated at WiUiam and Mary College, and his youth was spent amid the political excitements, when 
the War for Independence was kindling. He joined the Continental army, under ""''ashington, in 
1776, and during the campaigns of 1777 and 1778, he was aid to Lord Stirling. Atic.- the battle 
of Monmouth, lie left the army and commenced the study of law under Jefferson- He was again 
in the field when Arnold and Phillips invaded his State, in 1781 [page 330]. The next year, 
he was a member of the Virginia Legislature, and at the age of twenty-five, was elected a delegate 
to the Continental Congress. He was in active life as a legislator, foreign minister. Governor of 
Virginia, and President of the United States, until his retirement from the latter office m 1825. 
He died in the citv of New York, on the 4th of July, 1831, when in the seventy-second year of hi3 
age. His remains lie unmarked by anv monument, except a simple slab, in a cemetery on the 
north side of Second-street, in the citv of New York. * Page 351. 

' President Monroe, soon after his inauguration, made a long tour of observation, extending to 
Portland, in Maine, on the east, and to Detroit, on the west, in which he was occupied more than three 
months. He was everywhere received with the kindest attentions and highest honors, and hi« 
journey was conducive to the national good. 



1825.] 



MONROE'S ADMINISTRATION. 447 

eminent, had a President been surrounded with abler counselors.' Monro 3 
was a judicious and reliable man ; and when we reflect upon the condition of the 
country at that time — in a transition state from war and confusion to peace and 
order — his elevation to the presidency seems to have been a national blessing. 




/>^<^?-^^^-?- ^^ 



The administration of Mr. Monroe was marked by immense expansion in 
the material growth of the United States. During the war, a large number of 
manufacturing establishments had been nurtured into vigorous life by great 
demands and high prices ; but when peace returned, and European manufac- 
tures flooded the country at very low prices, wide-spread ruin ensued, and 
thousands of men were compelled to seek other employments. The apparent 
misfortune was a mercy in disguise, for the nation. Beyond the Alleghanies, 
millions of fertile acres, possessing real wealth, were awaiting the tiller's indus- 
try and skill." Agriculture beckoned the bankrupts to her fields. Homes in 



' His cabinet consisted of John Quincy Adams, Secretnry of State ; "William H. Crawford, Sec- 
retary of the Treasury ; John C. Cnlhoun, Secretary of "War ; Benjamin Crowninshield, Secretary of 
the Navy ; and "William "Wirt, Attorn ey-General. He offered the "\A^ar Department to the venerable 
Governor Shelby, of Kentucky [page 417], who declined it. Calhoun was appointed in December, 
1817. Crowninshield, who was in Madison's cabinet, continued in office until the close of Novem- 
ber, 1818, when Smith Thompson, of New York, was appointed in his place. 

^ The pii>-ress of the States and Territories west of the Alleghanies [note 3, page ir»], in wealth 
and population, is tnuy wonderful. A little more than seventy years ago, those immense 
lakes, Ontario, Erie, Michigan, Huron, and Superior, were entirely without commerce, and 
an Indian's canoe was almost the only craft seen iqion them. In 1882, the value of ti-affic 
upon these waters and the navigable rivers, is i)ro))al)]y not less than fifteen hundred million 
•dollars. Fifty years ago [lySiJ there were less than five thousand wiiite people in tlie va: I 



448 THE NATION. [ISIT. 

the East were deserted ; emigration flov/ed over the mountains in a broad and 
vigorous stream ; and before the close of Monroe's administration, four new 
sovereign States had started into being' from the wilderness of the great West, 
and one in the East.'^ 

The first year of Monroe's administration was chiefly distinguished by the 
admission [December 10, 1817] of a portion of the Mississippi Territory into 
the Union, as a State, ^ and the suppression of two piratical and slave-dealing 
establishments near the southern and south-western borders of the Republic. 
One of them was at the mouth of the St. Mary's, Florida, and the other at 
Galveston, Texas. In addition to a clandestine trade in slaves, these bucca- 
neers,^ under pretense of authority from some of the Spanish republics of 
South America," were endeavoring to liberate the Floridas from the dominion 
of Spain. In November, 1817, United States troops proceeded to take pos- 
session of Amelia Island, the rendezvous of the pirates on the Florida coast, and 
the Galveston establishment soon disappeared for want of support. 

Other serious difficulties arose at about the same time. A motley host, 
composed chiefly of Seminole Indians,* Creeks dissatisfied with the treaty of 
1814,' and runaway negroes, commenced mui-derous depredations upon the 
frontier settlements of Georgia and the Alabama Territory, toward the close of 
1817. General Gaines* was sent to suppress these outrages, and to remove 
every Indian from the territory which the Creeks had ceded to the United 
States, in 1814. His presence aroused the fiercest ire of the Indians, who, it 
was ascertained, were incited to hostilities by British subjects, protected by the 
Spanish authorities in Florida. Gaines was placed in a perilous position, when 
General Jackson, with a thousand mounted Tennessee volunteers, hastened 
[January, 1818] to his aid. In March, 1818, he invaded Florida, took pos- 
session [April] of the weak Spanish post of St. Mark, at the head of Apa- 
lachee Bay,* and sent the civil authorities and troops to Pensacola." At St. 
Mark he secured the persons of Alexander Arbuthnot and Robert C. Ambrister, 
who, on being tried [April 26] by a court martial, were found guilty of being 
the principal emissaries among the southern Indians, inciting them to hostilities. 

region between Lake Michigan and the Pacific Ocean ; now [1883] tlie number is fully eight 
million. Chicago was then a mere hamlet ; now [1883] it is a fine city, a great railway 
centre, and conlains more than five hundred thousand inhabitants. And never was the 
growth of the Great West more rapid than at the present. 

' "Mississippi, December 10, 1817; Illinois, December 3, 1818; Alabama, December 14, 1819; 
and Missouri, March 2, 1821. '^ Maine, March 3, 1820. 

^ The Territory was divided. The w^estern portiou was made a State, and the eastern was 
erected into a Territory, named Alabama, after its principal river. It included a portion of Georgia, 
given for a consideration. See page 455. * Note 6, page 149. 

* During the first quarter of the present century, nearly all of the countries in Central and South 
America, which, since the conquests of Cortez [page 43] and Pizarro [note 4, page 44], had been 
under the Spanish yoke, rebelled, and forming republics, became independent of Spain. It was the 
policy of our government to encourage these republics, by preventing the estabhshment of monarch- 
ical power on the American continent. This is known as the " Monroe doctrine," a term frequently 
used in political circles. 

• Pase 30. ^ Note 8, page 428. 

» Page 398. Edmund P. Gaines was bom in Virginia, in 1111. He entered the army in 1799, 
and rose gradually until he was made Major-General for his gallantry at Fort Erie [page 433] in 
1814. He remained in the army until his death, in 1849. ' Page 44. »» Page 438. 



1825.] MONROE'S ADMINISTI: -TIOIs^. 45X 

They vrere both exscutedon the 30th of the samo •^•'onth.' Jackson soon after- 
ward marched for Pensacola, it being known that ttie Spanish authorities there 
had encouraged the Indians in making depredations in Alabama. The Spanish 
governor protested against this invasion of his territory ; but Jackson, satisfied 
of his complicity with the Indians, pushed forAfard and seized Pensacola on the 
24th of May. The governor and a few followers fled on horseback to Fort 
Barrancas, at the entrance to Pensacola Bay. This fortress was captured by 
Jackson three days afterward [May 27], and the Spanish authorities and troops 
were sent to Havana. 

For this invasion of the territory of a friendly power, and his summary pro- 
ceedings there, General Jackson was much censured. His plea, in justification, 
was the known interference of the Spanish authorities in Florida, in our domes- 
tic aflairs, by sheltering those who were exciting the Indians to bloody deeds ; 
and the absolute necessity of prompt and efficient measures at the time. He 
was sustained by the government and the voice of the people. These measures 
developed the necessity for a general and thorough settlement of affairs on the 
southern boundary of the Republic, and led to the important treaty'^ concluded 
at Washington City, in February, 1819, by which Spain ceded to the United 
States the whole of the Floridas, and the adjacent islands. That country was 
erected into a Territory in February, 1821 ; and in March ensuing, General 
Jackson was appointed the first governor of the newly-acquired domain. 

We have observed that the vast region of Louisiana, purchased from France 
in 1803, was divided into two Territories.' The Louisiana Territory was 
admitted into the Union as a State, in 1812 ;* and while the treaty concem- 
iug Florida was pending, the southern portion of the remainder of the Ter- 
ritory extending westward to the Pacific Ocean, which was erected into the 
"Missouri Territory" in 1812, was formed into a separate government in 
1819, and called Arkansas. In December, the same year, Alabama was 



' Arbuthnot was a Scotch trader from New Providence, one of the Bermuda Islands. He had 
a store on the Suwaney River, where many of the hostOe Indians and negroes congregated. Am- 
brister was a young EngUshman, about twenty-one years of age, wno had borne a heutenant's 
commission in the British service. He was also at the Suwaney settlements, and put himself at the 
head of the Indians and negroes. 

' Made by John Quincy Adams for the United States, and Don Onis, the Spanish embassador 
at Washington. Hitherto, the United States had claimed a large portion of Texas, as a part of 
Louisiana. By this treaty, Texas was retained by the Spaniards. The cession was made as an 
equivalent for all claims against Spain for injury done the American commerce, to an amount not 
exceeding five millions of dollars. The treaty was not finally ratified until February, 1821. 

' Page 390. 

* The admirable penal code of Louisiana, which has ever stood the test of severe criticism, is 
the work of Edward Livingston, who was appointed the principal of a commission appointed to 
codify the laws of that State. The code, of which he was the sole author, was adopted in 1824. 
Mr. Livingston was born upon the "Manor," in Columbia county, New York, in 17G4. He was 
educated at Princeton, studied law under Chancellor Lansing, and became eminent in his profession. 
He became a member of Congress in 1794, then attorney for the district of New York, and finally, 
he went to New Orleans to retrieve a broken fortune. He was an aid to General Jackson, in the 
battle at New Orleans, in January, 1815, and his pen wrote the noble defense of that soldier, when 
he was persecuted by civil officers in that city. See page 443. When the last page of his manu- 
Bcript code of laws for Louisiana was ready for the press, a fire consumed the whole, and he was 
two years reproducing it. That work is his monument. Mr. Livingston was Secretary of State 
under President Jackson ; and in 1833, he was sent to France, as the resident minister of the 
United States. He died in Duchess county, New York, in May, 1837. 



452 



THE NATION. 



[1817. 



admitted into the Union; and at the same time, Missouri and Maine were 
making overtures for a similar position. Maine was admitted in March, 1820,' 
but the entrance of Missouri was delayed until August, 1821, by a violent and 
protracted debate which sprung up between the Northern and the Southern 
members of Congress on the subject of slavery, elicited by the proposition for 
its admission. 





(^-d^^^^<^^:^i>^^ 



It was during the session of 1818-19, that a bill was introduced into Con-^ 
gress, which contained a provision forbidding the existence of slavery or invol- 
untary servitude in the new State of Missouri, when admitted. Heated debates 
immediately occurred, and the subject was postponed until another session. 
The whole country, in the mean while, was agitated by disputes on the subject ; 
and demagogues, as usual at the North and at the South, raised the cry of Dis- 
union of the Confederation ! Both parties prepared for the great struggle ; 
and when the subject was again brought before Congress [November 23, 1820], 
angry disputes and long discussions ensued. A compromise was finally agreed 
to [February 28. 1821], by which slavery should be allowed in Missouri and 
in all territory south of thirty-six degrees and thirty minutes north latitude 
(southern boundary of Missouri), and prohibited in all the territory northerly 
and westerly of these limits. This is known as The 3Iisso7/ri Compromise.' 
Under this compromise, Missouri was admitted on the 21st of August, 1821, and 



Page 129. 



"" Page 501. 



1825.] MONROE'S ADMINISTRATION. 453 

the excitement on the subject ceased. The Republic was now composed of 
twenty-four States. 

While the Missouri question was pending, a new election for President and 
Vice-President of the United States, took place. Never, since the foundation 
of the government, had there been an election so quiet, and so void of party 
virulence. Mr. Monroe was re-elected President, and Mr. Tompkins' Vice- 
President [November, 1820], by an almost unanimous vote — the old Federal 
party," as an organization, being nearly extinct. The administration had been 
very popular, and the country was blessed with general prosperity. Two other 
measures, besides those already noticed, received the warmest approbation of the 
people. The first was an act of Congress, passed in March, 1818, in pursu- 
ance of Monroe's recommendation, making provision, in some degree, for the 
surviving officers and soldiers of the Revolution. It was subsequently extended, 
so as to include the widows and children of those who were deceased. The 
other was an arrangement made with Great Britain, in October, 1818, by 
which American citizens were allowed to share with those of that realm, in the 
valuable Newfoundland fisheries. At the same time, the northern boundary 
of the United States, from the Lake of the Woods to the Rocky Mountains, 
was defined.' 

Few events of general importance, aside from the rapid progress of the 
country in all its industrial and governmental operations, occurred during the 
remainder of Monroe's administration, except the suppression of piracy among 
the West India Islands, and the visit of General La Fayette* to the United 
States, as the nation's guest. The commerce of the United States had been 
greatly annoyed and injured by swarms of pirates who infested the West India 
seas. A small American squadron, under Commodore Perry,'' had been sent 
thither in 1819, to chastise the buccaneers. Perry died of the yellow fever in 
the performance of his duty, and very little was done at that time. About four 
years later [1822], a small American squadron destroyed more than twenty 
piratical vessels on the coast of Cuba ; and the following year the work was 
completed by a larger force, under Commodore Porter.^ The second-named 
event was of a more pleasing character. La Fayette, the companion-in-arms 
of Washington^ during the Revolutionary struggle, arrived at New York, from 
France, in August, 1824, and during about eleven succeeding months, he made 
a tour of over five thousand miles, throughout the United States. He was 
everywhere greeted with the warmest enthusiasm, and was often met by men 
who had served under him in the first War for Independence. When he was 
prepared to return, an American frigate, named Brandywine^ in compliment 
to him,^ was sent by the United States government to convey him back to 
France. 

Mr. Monroe's administration now drew toward a close, and in the autumn 

' Page 446. ' Page 374. ^ Page 479. 

* Page 273. " Page 423. ' Page 431. ' Page 273. 

* La Fayette's first battle for freedom in America, vv^as that on the Brandywine Creek, in Sep- 
tember, 1777, where he was wounded in the leg. See note 5, page 273. 



454 THE NATION. [1825: 

of 1824, the people were called upon to select his successor. It soon became 
evident that a large proportion of the old politicians of the Democratic party 
had decided to support William H. Crawford, the Secretary of the Treasury, 
for the succession. Four candidates, representing the different sections of the 
Union,' were finally put in nomination. The result was, that the choice de- 
volved upon the House of Representatives, for the second time.* That body^ 
by an election held in February, 1825, chose John Quincy Adams for Presi- 
dent. John C. Calhoun had been chosen Vice-President by the people. The 
election and final choice produced great excitement throughout the country, 
and engendered political rancor equal to that which prevailed during the admin- 
istration of the elder Adams. Mr. Monroe's administration closed on the 4th 
of March ensuing, and he resigned to his successor the Chief Magistracy of a 
highly-prosperous nation. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS'S ADMINISTRATION. [1825—1829.] 

At about half-past twelve o'clock, on the 4th day of March, 1825, John 
Quincy Adams,' son of the second President of the United States, entered the 
hall of the House of Representatives, and took his seat in the chair of the 
Speaker. He was dressed in a suit of black cloth, and, being small in stature, 
did not present a more dignified appearance than hundreds of his fellow-citizens 
around him. He appeared, as he really was, a plain Republican — one of the 
people. When silence was obtained, he arose and delivered his inaugural ad- 
dress ; then descending, he placed himself on the right hand of a table, and 
took the oath of office, administered by Chief-Justice Marshall. The Senate 
being in session, Mr. Adams immediately nominated his cabinet officers,^ and 

* John Quincy Adams in the East, WiUiam 11. Crawford in the South, Andrew Jackson and 
Henry Clay in the West. ^ Page 388. 

' John Quincy Adams, the sixth President of the United States, was bom at Quincy, Massa- 
chusetts, on the ilth of July, 1767. He went to Europe, with his father, at the age of eleven 
years ; and, in Paris, he was much in the society of Franklin and other distinguished men. At the 
age of fourteen years he accompanied Mr. Dana to St. Petersburg, as private secretary to that em- 
bassador. He traveled much alone, and finally returned, and finished his education at Harvard 
College. He became a lawyer, but public service kept him fi'om that pursuit. He was made 
United States minister to the Netherlands in 1794, and afterward held tlie same office at Lisbon 
and Berlin. He was a member of the United States Senate in 1803 ; and in 1809 he was sent as 
minister to the Russian court. After negotiating a treaty of peace at Ghent [page 443], he was ap- 
pointed minister to the English court. In 1817 he was made Secretary of State, by Mr. Monroe. 
Having served one term as President of the United States, he retired; and from 1831, he was a 
member of Congress until his death, which occurred in the Speaker's room, at the Natioal Capitol, 
on the 22d of February, 1848, when in the eighty-first year of his age. 

* Henry Clay, Secretary of State ; Richard Rush, Secretary of the Treasury ; James Barbour, 
Secretary of War ; Samuel L. Southard (continued in ofBce), Secretary of the Navy ; and "William 
Wirt (continued), Attorney-General. There was considerable opposition in the Senate to the con- 
firmation of Henry Clay's nomination. He had been charged with defeating the election of General 
Jackson, by giving his influence to Mr. Adams, on condition that he should be appointed his Secre- 



1829.] JOHN QUINCY ADAMS'S ADMINISTRATION. 455 

all 'but one were confirmed by a unanimous vote of that body. His political 
views were consonant with those of Mr. Monroe, and the foreign and domestic 
policy of his administration were generally conformable to those views. The 
amity which existed between the United States and foreign governments, and 
the absence of serious domestic troubles, made the administration of Mr. Adama 




eA-clcUky^ 



a remarkably quiet one, and gave the executive opportunities for adjusting the 
operations of treaties with the Indian tri1)es, and the arrangement of measures 
for the promotion of those great staple interests of the country — agriculture, 
commerce, and manufactures. Discords, which the election had produced, ex- 
cited the whole country during Mr. Adams's administration, with the agitations 
incident to excessive party zeal, and bitter party rancor ; yet the President, 
thoroughly acquainted with all the public interests, and as thoroughly skilled 
in every art of diplomacy and jurisprudence, managed the affairs of State with 
a fidelity and sagacity which command our warmest approbation. 

One of the most exciting topics, for thought and discussion, at the beginning 
of Adams's administration [1825], was a controversy between the National Gov- 
ernment and the chief magistrate of Georgia, concerning the lands of the Creek 
Indians, and the removal of those aboriginals from the territory of that State, 
When Georgia relinquished her claims to considerable portions of the Missis- 
sippi Territory,' the Federal Government agreed to purchase, for that State, 



tary of State. This, however, was only a bubble on the surface of political strife, and had no truth- 
fill substance. In the Senate, there were twenty-seven votes in favor, and fourteen against con- 
firming the nommation of Mr. Clay. * Note 2, page 447. 



456 



THE NATION. 



[1826. 



tiie Indian lands within its borders, " whenever it could be peaceably done upon 
reasonable terms." The Creeks, who, with their neighbors, the Cherokees, 
■were beginning to practice the arts of civilized life, refused to sell their lands. 
Troup, the governor of Georgia, demanded the immediate fulfillment of the con- 
ract. He caused a survey of the lands to be made, and prepared to distribute 




them by lottery, to the citizens of that State. Impatient at the tardiness of the 
United States in extinguishing the Indian titles and removing the remnants of 
the tribes, according to stipulation, the governor assumed the right to do it him- 
self. The United States took the attitude of defenders of the Indians, and, for 
a time, the matter bore a serious aspect. The difficulties were finally settled, 
and the Creeks' and Cherokees" gradually removed to the rich wilderness be- 
yond the Mississippi. 

At about this time a great work of internal improvement was completed. 
The Erie Canal, in the State of New York, was finished in 1825. It was the 
most important and stupendous public improvement ever undertaken in the 
United States ; and, though it was the enterprise of the people of a single State, 
that originated and accomplished the labor of forming the channel of a river 
through a large extent of country, it has a character of nationality. Its earli- 
est advocate was Jesse Hawley, who, in a series of articles published in 1807 
and 1808, signed Hercules^ set forth the feasibility and great importance of 
such a connection of the waters of Lake Erie and the Hudson River. ^ His 



^ In a manuscript letter now before the writer, dated "Albany, 4th March, 1822," Dewitt Clin- 
ton says to Jesse Hawley, to whom the letter is addressed : "In answer to your letter, I have no 



1829.] JOHN QUINCY ADAMS'S ADMINISTRATION. 457 

views were warmly seconded by Gouverneur Morris,' Dewitt Clinton, and a 
few others, and its final accomplishment was the result, chiefly, of the untir- 
ing eflbrts, privately and ofiicially, of the latter gentleman, while a member 
of the Legislature and governor of the State of New York. It is three hun- 
dred and sixty- three miles in length, and the first estimate of its cost was 
^5,000,000. Portions of it have since been enlarged, to meet the increasing 
demands of its commerce ; and in 1853, the people of the State decided, by a 
general vote, to have it enlarged its entire length. That work is not yet 
[1883] accomplished. 

A most remarkable coincidence occurred on the 4th of July, 1826, the fif- 
tieth anniversary of American Independence. On that day, and almost at the 
same hour, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson expired. They were both mem- 
bers of the committee who had framed the Declaration of Independence,'^ both 
signed it,' both had been foreign ministers,* both had been Vice-Presidents, and 
then Presidents of the United States, and both had lived to a great age." These 
coincidences, and the manner and time of their death, produced a profound im- 
pression upon the public mind. In many places throughout the Union, eulogies 
or funeral orations were pronounced, and these, collected, form one of the most 
remarkable contributions to our historical and biographical literature. 

After the difficulties with Georgia were settled, the remaining years of Mr. 
Adams's administration were so peaceful and prosperous, that public aflairs 
present veryfev^r topics for the pen of the general historian.* The most import- 
ant movement in foreign policy, was the appointment, early in 1826, of com- 
missioners' to attend a congress of representatives of the South American Re- 
publics,^ held at Panama [July, 1826], on the Pacific coast. This appointment 

hesitation in stating that the first suggestion of a canal from Lalce Erie to the Hudson River, which 
came to my knowledge, was communicated in essays under the signature of Hercules, on Internal 
Navigation, published in the Ontario Messenger, at Canandaigua. The first number appeared on 
the 27th of October, 1807, and the series of numbers amounted, I believe, to fourteen. The board 
of Canal Commissioners, which made the first tour of observation and survey, in 1810, were pos- 
sessed of the writings of Hercules, which were duly appreciated, as the work of a sagacious in- 
ventor and elevated mind. And you were at that time, and since, considered the author." Dewitt 
Clinton was a son of General James Clinton, of Orange county, New York. He was born in 
March, 1769. He was mayor of New York ten years, and was elected governor of the State in 
1817, and again in 1820 and 1826. He died suddenly while in that office, in February, 1828. 

' Page 364. ^ Note 2, page 251. 

^ Jefferson was its author, and Adams its principal supporter, in the Continental Congress. 

* Note 2, page 383, and note 5, page 388. 

* Mr. Adams died at Quincy, Massachusetts, at the age of almost ninety-one years. Mr. Jefler- 
son died at Monticello, Virginia, at the age of almost eighty-three years. 

* An event occurred in 1826 which produced great excitement "throughout the country, and led 
to the formation of a new, and for a time, quite a powerful political party. "William Morgan, of 
Western New York, announced his intention to publish a book, in which the secrets of Free 
Masonry were to be disclosed. He was suddenly seized at Canandaigua one evening, placed in a 
carriage, and was never heard of afterward. Some Free Masons were charged with his murder, 
and tlie report of an investigating committee, appointed by the New York State Legislature, con- 
firmed the suspicion. The public mind was greatly agitated, and there was a disposition to exclude 
Free Masons from office. An Anti-ilasonic party was formed, and its organization spread over 
several States. In 1832, a national anti-Masonic convention was held at Philadelphia, and "WiUiam 
"Wirt, of Virginia, was nominated for tlie office of President of the United States. Although the 
party polled a considerable vote, it soon afterward disappeared. 

' R. C. Addison, and John Sargeant, commissioners ; and "WOliam B. Rochester, of New York, 
their secretary. 

^ Note 5, page 448. As early as 1823, General BoUvar, while acting as President of Colombia, 



458 



THE NATION. 



[1825, 



produced much discussion in Congress, chiefly on party grounds. The result 
of the congress at Panama was comparatively unimportant, so far as the United 
States was concerned, and appears to have had very little influence on the 
affairs of South America. 

During the administration of Mr. Adams, the policy of protecting home 




manufactures, by imposing a heavy duty upon foreign articles of the same kind, 
assumed the shape of a settled national policy, and the foundations of th& 
American System, as that policy is called, was then laid. The illiberal commer- 
cial policy of Great Britain, caused tariff laws to be enacted by Congress as 
early as 1816, as retaliatory measures. ' In 1824, imposts were laid on foreign 
fabrics, with a view to encourage American manufactures. In July, 1827, a 
national convention was held at Harrisburg, in Pennsylvania, to discuss the 
subject of protective tariffs. Only four of the slave States sent delegates. The 
result of the convention was a memorial to Congress, asking an augmentation 
of duties on several articles then manufactured in the United States. The Sec- 
retary of the Treasury called attention to the subject in his report in Decem- 

invited the governments of Mexico, Peru, Chili, and Buenos Ayres, to unite with him in forming a 
general congress at Panama, and the same year arrangements between Colombia, Mexico, and 
Peru were made, to effect that object. In the spring of 1825, the United States government was 
invited to send a delegation to the proposed congress. The objects of the congress were, to settle 
upon some line of policy having the force of international law, respecting the rights of those repub- 
lics ; and to consult upon measures to be taken to prevent further colonization on the American 
continent by European powers, and their interference in then existmg contests. 
' Page 367. 



1829.] JACKSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 459 

ber following. Congress, at an early period of the session of 1827-'28, took 
up the matter, and a Tai'iff Bill became a law in May following. The Amer- 
ican System was very popular with the manufacturers of the North, but the 
cotton-growing States, which found a ready market for the raw material in En- 
gland, opposed it. The taritf law, passed on the 15th of May, 1828, was very 
obnoxious to the Southern politicians.^ They denounced it as oppressive and 
unconstitutional, and became rebeUious in 1832 and 1833.^ 

The Presidential election took place in the autumn of 1828, when the pub- 
lic mind was highly excited. For a long time the opposing parties had been 
marshaling their forces for the contest. The candidates were John Quincy 
Adams and General Andrew Jackson. The result was the defeat of Mr. Adams, 
and the election of General Jackson. John C. Calhoun,^ of South Carolina, 
was elected Vice-President, and both had very large majorities. During the 
contest, the people appeared to be on the verge of civil war, so violent was the 
party strife, and so malignant were the denunciations of the candidates. When 
it was over, perfect tranquillity prevailed, the people cheerfully acquiesced in 
the result, and our sytem of government was nobly vindicated before the world. 

President Adams retired from office on the 4th of March, 1829. He left 
to his successor a legacy of unexampled national prosperity, peaceful relations 
with all the world, a greatly diminished national debt, and a surplus of more 
than five millions of dollars in the public treasury. He also bequeathed to the 
Republic the tearful gratitude of the surviving soldiers of the Revolution, 
among whom had been distributed in pensions,* during his administration, more 
than five millions of dollars. 



CHAPTER IX. 

JACKSON'S ADMINISTRATION. [1829 — 1837] 

There were incidents of peculiar interest connected with the inauguration 
of Andrew Jackson," the seventh President of the United States. President 

' The chief articles on which heavy protective duties were laid, were woolen and cotton fab- 
rics. At that time, the value of annual imports of cotton goods from Great Britain was about 
$8,000,000 ; that of woolen goods about the same. The exports to Great Britain, of cotton, rice, 
and tobacco, alone (the chief products of the Southern States), was about $24,000,000 annuaUy 
These producers were made to fear a great diminution of their exports, by a tariff that should 
almost wholly prohibit the importation of three millions of dollars' worth of British cotton and 
.woolen fabrics, annually. "^ Page 463. 

^ John C. Calhoun was born in South Carolina in 1182. He first appeared in Congress in 1811, 
and was always distinguished for his consistency, especially in his support of the institution of 
slavery and the doctrme of State supremacy. He was an able debater, and subtle politician ; 
and the logical result of his political teachings was the late Civil "War. He died at "Washington 
city, while a member of the National Senate, in March, 1850. ^ Page 453. 

^Andrew Jackson was born in Mecklenberg countj-, North Carolina, in March, 1T67. His 
parents were from the north of Ireland, and belonged to that Protestant community known as 
Scotch-Irish. In earhest infancy, he was left to the care of an excellent mother, by the death of 
)us father. He first saw the horrors of war, and felt the wrongs of oppression, when Colonel 



460 



THE NATION. 



[1829. 



Adams had convened the Senate on the morning of the 4th of March, 1829, 
and at twelve o'clock that bodj adjourned for an hour. During that time, the 
President elect entered the Senate chamber, having been escorted from Gadsbj's 
Hotel, bj a few surviving officers and soldiers of the old War for Independence. 
These had addressed him at the hotel, and now, in presence of the chief officers 
of government, foreign ministers, and a large number of ladies, he thus replied 
to them : 




" Respected Friends — Your affijctionate address awakens sentiments and 
recollections which I feel with sincerity and cherish with pride. To have 
around my person, at the moment of undertaking the most solemn of all duties 
to my country, the companions of the immortal Washington, will affijrd me 
satisfaction and grateful encouragement. That by my best exertions, I shall be 
able to exhibit more than an imitation of his labors, a sense of my own imper- 

Buford's troops were massacred [page 313, and note 1, page 314] in his neighborhood, in 1180. 
He entered the army, and suffered in the cause of freedom, by imprisonment, and the death of hia 
mother while she was on an errand of mercy. He studied law, and became one of the most 
eminent men in the Western District of Tennessee, as an advocate and a judge. He was ever a 
controlling spirit in that region. He assisted in framing a State constitution for Tennessee, and was 
the first representative of that State in the National Congress. He became United States senator in 
1797, and was soon afterward appointed Judge of the Supreme Court of his State. He settled near 
NashviUe, and for a long time was chief military commander in that region. When the War of 
1812 broke out, he took the field, and in the capacity of Major-General, he did good service in the 
southern country, till its close. He was appointed the first Governor of Florida, in 1821, and in 
1823, was again in the United States Senate. He retired to private life at the close of his presi- 
dential term, and died at his beautiful residence, The Hermitage, near Nashville, in June, 1845, at 
the age of seventy-eight years. 



1837.] JACKSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 461 

fections, and the reverence I entertain for his virtues, forbid me to hope. To 
you, respected friends, the survivors of that heroic band who followed him, so 
long and so valiantly, in the path of glory, I offer my sincere thanks, and to 
Heaven my prayers, that your remaining years may be as happy as your toils 
and your lives have been illustrious." The whole company then proceeded to 
the eastern portico of the capitol, where, in the presence of a vast assembly of 
citizens, the President elect delivered his inaugural address, and took the oath 
of office, administered by Chief Justice Marshall.' That jurist again adminis- 
tered the same oath to President Jackson on the 4th of March, 1833, and a 
few months afterward went down into the grave. 

President Jackson was possessed of strong passions, an uncorrupt heart, and 
an iron will. Honest and inflexible, he seized the helm of the ship of state 
with a patriot's hand, resolved to steer it according to his own conceptions of 
the meaning of his guiding chart, The Constitution^ unmindful of the inter- 
ference of friends or foes. His instructions to the first minister sent to England, 
on his nomination — "Ask nothing but what is right; submit to nothing 
wrong" — indicate the character of those moral and political maxims by which 
he was governed. His audacity amazed his fi-iends and alarmed his opponents ; 
and no middle men existed. He was either thoroughly loved or thoroughly 
hated; and for eight years he braved the fierce tempests of party strife,* 
domestic perplexities,^ and foreign arrogance,* with a skill and Courage whi«h 
demands the admiration of his countrymen, however much they may differ with 
him in matters of national policy. The gulf between him and his political oppo- 
nents was so wide, that it was difficult for the broadest charity to bridge it. To 
those who had been his true friends during the election struggle, he extended the 
grateful hand of recognition, and after having his inquiries satisfied, "Is he 
capable ? is he honest?" he conferred official station upon the man who pleased 
him, with a stoical indifference to the clamor of the opposition. The whole of 
President Adams's cabinet officers having resigned, Jackson immediately nom- 
inated his political friends for his counselors, and the Senate confirmed his 
choice.' 

Among the first subjects of general and commanding interest which occu- 
pied the attention of President Jackson, at the commencement of his administra- 
tion, were the claims of Georgia to huids held by the powerful Cherokee tribe 
of Indians, and lying within the limits of that State. Jackson favored the views 
of the Georgia authorities, and the white people proceeded to take possession of 
the Indians' land. Trouble ensued, and the southern portion of the Republic was 



' Page 351. 

' Following the precedent of Jefiferson [page 389], he filled a large number of the public offices 
with his pohtical friends, after removing the incumbents. These removals were for all causes ; and 
during his administration, they amounted to six hundred and ninety out of several thousands, who 
were removable. The entire number of removals made by all the preceding Presidents, from 1790 
to 1829, was seventy-four. =■ Page 464. * Page 468. 

' Martin Van Buren, Secretary of State ; Samuel D. Ingham, Secretary of the Treasury ; Joha 
H. Eaton, Secretary of War ; John Branch, Secretary of the Navy ; and John McPherson Berrian, 
Attorney-General. It having been determined to make the Postmaster-General a cabinet officer, 
William T. Barry was appointed to that station. 



462 THK NATION. [1829 

again menaee«i T^itli civil vrar. The matter was adjudicated bj the Supreme 
Court of the United States, and on the 30th of March, 1832, that tribunal 
decided against the claims of Georgia. " But that State, favored bj the Presi- 
dent, resisted the decision. The difficulty was finally adjusted; and in 1838, 
General Winfield Scott' was sent thither, with several thousand troops, to 
remove the Cherokees, peaceably if possible, but forcibly if necessary, beyond 
the Mississippi. Through the kindness and conciliation of Scott, they were 
induced to migrate. They had become involved in the difficulties of their Creek 
neighbors,* but were defended against the encroachments of the Georgians 
during Adams's administration. But in December, 1839, they were crushed, as 
a nation, by an act of Congress, and another of the ancient communities of the 
New World was wiped from the living record of empire. The Cherokees' were 
more advanced in the arts of civilized life than the Creeks." They had churches, 
schools, and a printing-press, and were becoming successful agriculturists. It 
appeared cruel in the extreme to remove them from their fertile lands and the 
graves of their fathers, to the wilderness ; yet it was, doubtless, a proper meas- 
ure for insuring the prosperity of both races. But now [1883], again, the tide 
of civilization is beating against their borders. Will they not be borne upon its 
powerful wave, further into the wilderness ? 

Another cause for public agitation appeared in 1832. In his first annual 
message [December, 1829] Jackson took strong ground against the renewal of 
the charter of the United States Bank,^ on the ground that it had failed in the 
great end of establishing a uniform and sound currency, and that such an insti- 
tution was not authorized by the jSTational Constitution. He again attacked the 
bank in his annual message in 1830, and his objections were renewed in that 
of 1831. At the close of 1831, the proper officers of the bank, for the first 
time, petitioned for a renewal of its charter. That petition was presented in 
the Senate on the 9th of January, 1832, and on the 13th of March, a select com- 
mittee to whom it was referred, reported in favor of renewing the charter for 
fifteen years. Long debates ensued ; and, finally, a bill for re-chartering the 
bank passed both Houses of Congress : the Senate on the 11th of June, by 
twenty-eight against twenty votes ; and by the House of Representatives on the 
3d of July, by one hundred and seven against eighty-five. Jackson vetoed" it 
on the lOtli of July, and as it failed to receive the support of two thirds of the 
members of both Houses, the bank charter expired, by limitation, in 1836. 
The commercial community, regarding a national bank as essential to their 
prosperity, were alarmed ; and prophecies of panics and business revulsions, 
everywhere uttered, helped to accomplish their own speedy fulfillment. 

An Indian war broke out upon the north-western frontier, in the spring of 
1832. Portions of some of the western tribes,' residing within the domain 

' Page 485. « Page 427. ^ Page 2T. * Page 30. ^ Page 446. 

^ That is, refused to sign it, and returned it to Congress, with his reasons, for reconsideration by 
that body. The Constitution gives the President this power, and when exercised, a bill can not 
become law without his signature, unless it shall, on reconsideration, receive the votes of two thirds 
of the members of both Houses of Congress. See Article 1, Section 7, of the Constitution, in the 
Supplement. ' Sacs, Foxes, and Winnebagoes. See page 18. 



1837.] JACKSON'S ADMINISTK ATION. 463 

cf the present State of Wisconsin/ led by Black Hawk,' a fiery Sac chief, 
commenced Avarfare upon the frontier settlers of Illinois, in April of that year. 
After several skirmishes with United States troops and Illinois militia, undei 
General Atkinson,^ the Indians were driven beyond the Mississippi. Black 
Hawk was captured in August, 1832, and taken to Washington City; and then, 
to impress his mind with the strength of the nation he had foolishly made war 
with, he was conducted through several of the eastern cities. This brief strife, 
which appeared quite alarming at one time, is known in history as the " Black 
Hawk War." * 

This cloud in the West had scarcely disappeared, when one loomed up in 
the South far more formidable in appearance, and charged with menacing thun- 




'^^^^c^^ 



der that, for a while, shook the entire fabric of the Republic. The dis- 
contents of the cotton-growing States, produced by the tariff act of 1828,* 
assumed the form of rebellion in South Carolina, toward the close of 1832. 
An act of Congress, imposing additional duties upon foreign goods, passed in 



' That domain was not erected into a Territory until four years after that event ; now it is a rich, 
nopulous, and flourishing State. " Page 18. 

* Henry Atkinson was a native of North Carolina, and entered the army as captain, in 1808. 
He was retained in the army after the second War for Independence, was made Adjutant-General, 
and was finally appointed to the command of the "Western Army. He died at Jeiferson Barracks, 
in Jun'^, 1 842. 

* Black Hawk returned to his people, but was, with difficulty, restnred to his former dignity of 
chief. He died in October, 1840, and was buried on the banks of the Mississippi. ' Page 459. 



464 THE N A 'J I N. [1829. 

the spring of 1832, led to a State convention in South Carolina, in November 
following. It assembled on the 19th of that month, and the Governor of South 
Carolina was appointed its president. That assembly declared the tariff acts 
unconstitutional, and therefore null and void. It resolved that duties should 
not be paid ; and proclaimed that any attempt to enforce the collection of duties 
in the port of Charleston, by the general government, would be resisted by 
arms and would produce the withdrawal of South Carolina from the Union. 
The State Legislature, which met directly after the adjournment of the con- 
vention, passed laws in support of this determination. Military preparations 
were immediately made, and civil war appeared inevitable. Then it was that 
the executive ability of the Pi-esident, so much needed, was fully displayed. 
Jackson promptly met the crisis by a proclamation, on the 10th of December, 
which denied the right of a State to nullify any act of the National Govern- 
ment ; and warned those who were engaged in fomenting a rebellion, that the 
laws of the United States would be strictly enforced by military power, if 
necessary. This proclamation met the hearty response of every friend of the 
Union, of whatever party, and greatly increased that majority of the President's 
supporters, who had just re-elected him to the Chief Magistracy of the Repub- 
lic' The nullifiers' of South Carolina, though led by such able men as Cal- 
houn' and Hayne,* were obliged to yield for the moment ; yet their zeal and 
determination in the cause of State Supremacy, were noo abated. Every day 
the tempest-cloud of civil commotion grew darker and darker ; until, at length, 
Henry Clay,' a warm friend of the American System," came forward, in Con- 
gress [February 12, 1833], with a bill, which provided for a gradual rediiclion 
of the obnoxious duties, during the succeeding ten years. This compromise 
measure was accepted by both parties. It became a law on the 3d of March, 
and discord between the North and the South soon ceased, but only for a 



* Those who favored the doctrine that a State might nullify the acts of the National Govern- 
ment, were called nullifiers, and the dangerous doctrine itself was called nullification. 

^ Page 458. Mr. Calhoun, who had quarreled, politically, with .Taoivson. had recently ret^igned 
the office of Vice-President of the United States, and was one of the ablest men in Congress. 
He asserted the State supremacy doctrine boldly on the floor of Congress, and held the same 
opiniou until his death. 

* Robert Y. Hayne was one of the ablest of southern statesmen. The debate between Hayne 
and Webster, in the Senate of the United States, during the debates on this momentous subject, is 
regarded as one of the most eminent, for sagacity and eloquence, that ever marked the proceedings 
of that body. Mr. Hayne was born near Charleston, Soutli Carolina, in November, 1791. He waa 
admitted to the bar in 1812, and the same year volunteered his services for the defense of the sea- 
board, and entered the army as lieutenant. He arose rapidly to the rank of Major-Gcneral of the 
militia of his State, and was considered one of the best disciplinarians of the South. He had exten- 
Bive practice at the bar, before he was twenty-two years of age, and it was always lucrative. He 
was a member of the South Carolina Assembly in 1814, where he was distinguisiied for eloquence. 
He was chosen Speaker in 1818. For ten years he represented South Carolina in the Senate of the 
United Stales ; and he was chairman of the Committee of the Convention of South Carolina, which 
reported the "ordinance of nullification." He was soon afterward chosen Governor of his State. 
He died in September, 1841, in the fiftieth year of his age. ' Page 500. " Page 459. 

^ It is known that Mr. Clay introduced the Compromise Bill wdth the concurrence of Mr. Calhoun. 
The latter had proceeded to the verge of treason, in his opposition to the general government, and 
President Jackson had threatened him with arrest, if he moved another step forward. Knowing^ 



1837.] JACKSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 465 

President Jackson's hostility to the United States Bank was again mani- 
fested in his annual message to Congress, in December, 1832, when he recom- 
mended the removal of the public funds from its custody, and a sale of the 
stock of the bank, belonging to the United States.' Congress, by a decided 
vote, refused to authorize the measure ; but after its adjournment, the Presi- 
dent assumed the responsibility of the act, and directed William J. Duane, the 
Secretary of the Treasury, to withdraw the government funds (then almost 
$10,000,000), and deposit them in certain State banks. During a northern 
tour which the President had made in the summer of 1833, he had urged Mr. 
Duane (then in Philadelphia) to make the removal, but he would only consent 
to the appointment of an agent to inquire upon what terms the local banks 
would receive the funds on deposit. The President then ordered him, perem- 
torily, to remove them from the bank. The Secretary refused compliance, and 
was dismissed from office. His successor, lioger B. Taney (who was after- 
ward Chief-Justice of the United States), obeyed the President; and in 
October, 1833, the act was accomplished. The effect produced was sudden 
and wide-spread commercial distress. The business of the country was plunged 
from the height of prosperity to the depths of adversity, because its intimate 
connection with the National Bank rendered any paralysis of the operations 
of that institution fatal to commercial activity. The amount of loans of the 
bank, on the 1st of October, was over sixty millions of dollars, and the amount 
of the funds of the United States, then on deposit in the bank, was almost ten 
millions of dollars. The fact, that the connection of the bank with the business 
of the country was so vital, confirmed the President in his opinion of the 
danger of such an enormous moneyed institution. 

A large portion of the government funds were removed in the course of four 
months, and the whole amount in about nine months. Intense excitement pre- 
vailed throughout the country ; yet the President, supported by the House of 
Representatives, persevered and triumphed. Numerous committees, appointed 
by merchants, mechanics, manufacturers, and others, waited upon him, to ask 
him to take some measures for relief He was firm ; and to all of them he re- 
plied, in substance, that ' ' the government could give no relief, and provide no 
remedy ; that the banks were the occasion of all the evils which existed, and that 



the firmness and decision of the President, Mr. Calhoun dared not take the fatal step. He could 
not recede, nor even stand still, without compromising his character with his pohtical friends. In 
this extremity, a mutual friend arranged witli Mr. Clay to propose a measure which would satisfy 
both sides, and save botli the neck and reputation of Mr. Calhoun. In the discussion of tho 
matter in the Senate, the latter most eai-nesdy disclaimed any hostile feelings toward the Union, 
on the part of South Carolina. The State authorities, he asserted, had looked only to a judicial 
decision upon the question, until the concentration of the United States troops at Charleston and 
Augusta, by order of the President, compelled them to make provision to defend themselves. 
Several of the State Legislatures hastened to condemn the nullification doctrine as destructive to 
the National Constitution. Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Delaware, Indiann, Missouri, 
and Georgia, all thus spoke out plainly in favor of the Union. Georgia, however, at the same 
time, expressed its reprobation of the "tariff system, which liad brought about the movement in 
South Carolina, and proposed a convention of the States of Virginia, North and South Carolina, 
Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, and Mississippi, to devise measures to obtain relief from it. 

' By the law of 1816, for chartering the bank, the funds of the United States were to be 
deposited with that institution, and to be withdrawn only by the Secretary of the Treasury. 

30 



406 



THE NATION. 



[1820. 



those who suffered by their great enterprise had none to blame but themselves ; 
that those who traded ou borrowed capital ought to break." The State banks 
received the government funds on deposit, and loaned freely. Confidence was 
gradually restored, and apparent general prospeiity' returned. Now [1867], 
after the lapse of more than twenty years, the wisdom and forecaste of General 
Jackson, evinced by his distrust of the TJnited States Bank, appears to be uni- 
versally acknowledged.* Our present National banking system possesses all of 
the better functions of that of the United States Bank, without, apparently, 
any of its dangerous ones. ^ 

Trouble again appeared on the southern borders of the Union. Toward the 
close of 1835, the Seminole Indians, in Florida, guided by their head sachem, 
Micanopy, and led by their principal chief, Osceola,* 
commenced a distressing warfare upon the frontier 
settlements of Florida. The cause of the outbreak 
^ ^ ^ yv^ ^^M^ was an attempt to remove them to the wilderness 

^ ^ ^ V^f^'^ bepond the Mississippi. In his annual message in 

December, 1830, President Jackson recommended 
the devotion of a large tract of land west of the 
Mississippi, to the use of the Indian tribes yet re- 
maining east of that stream, forever. Congress 
passed laws in accordance with the proposition, and 
ut,ui.uLA. ^1^^ work of removal commenced, first by the Chick- 

asaws and Choctaws.* We have seen that trouble ensued with the Creeks and 
Cherokees,' and the Seminoles in East Florida were not disposed to leave their 
ancient domain. Some of the chiefs in council made a treaty in May, 1832, 
and agreed to remove ; but other chiefs, and the great body of the nation, did 
not acknowledge the treaty as binding. In 1834, the President sent General 
Wiley Thompson to Florida, to prepare for a forcible removal of the Seminoles, 
if necessary. The tone and manner assumed by Osceola, at that time, dis- 
pleased Thompson, and he put the chief in irons and in prison for a day. The 
proud leader feigned penitence, and was released. Then his wounded pride 
called for revenge, and fearfully he pursued it, as we shall observe presently. 
The war that ensued was a sanguniary one, and almost seven years elapsed before 
it was wholly terminated. Osceola, with all the cunning of a Tecumtha,* and 
the heroism of a Philip,' was so successful in stratagem, and brave in conflict, 
that he baffled the skill and courage of the United States troops for a long time. 
He had agreed to fulfill treaty stipulations, « in December [1835J, but instead 




' Page 4'?0. 

' The course of President Jackson, toward the bank, was popular in many sections, but in the 
commercial States it caused a palpable diminution of the strength of the administration. This was 
shown by the elections in 1834. Many of his supporters joined the Opposition, and this combmed 
force assumed the name of " Whigs"— the old party name of ihe Revolution — while the admmis- 
tration party adhered to the name of " Democrats." 

^ Page 468. " Page 30. ' Page 27. ' Page 424. ' Page 124. 

* Osceola had promised General Thompson that the delivery of certain cattle and horses belong- 
ing to the Indians should be made during the first fortnight of December, 1835, and so certain was 
Thompson of the fulfillment of this stipulation, that he advertised the animals for sale. 



1837.] 



JACKSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



467 




■^■'^c^ 



iAT OF SEMINOLE WAR. 



of compliance, he was then at the head of a war p'^rty, murdering the unsus- 
pecting inhabitants on the borders of the everglade haunts of the savages. 

At that time General Clinch was stationed at Fort Drane,' in the interior 
of Florida, and Major Dade was dispatched from Fort Brooke, at the head of 
Tampa Bay, with more than a hundred men, for his 
relief (That young commander," and all but four of 
his detachment, were massacred [Dec. 28, 1835] 
near Wahoo Swamp.' On the same day, and only 
a few hours before, Osceola, and a small war party, 
killed and scalped General Thompson, and five of his 
friends, who were dining at a store a few yards from 
Fort King.* The assailants disappeared in the for- 
est before the deed was known at the fort. Two 
days afterward [Dec. 31], General Clin:li and his 
troops had a battle with the Seminoles on the With- 
lacoochee; and in February [Feb. 29, 1836], General Gaines^ was assailed 
near the same place," and several of his men Avere killed. The battle-ground 
is about fifty miles from the mouth of the river. 

The Creeks aided their brethren in Florida, by attacking white settlers 
within their domain,^ in May, 1836. Success made them bold, and they at- 
tacked mail-carriers, stages, steamboats, and finally villages, in Georgia and 
Alabama, until thousands of white people were fleeing for their lives from 
place to place, before the savages. General Winficld Scott* was now in chief 
command in the South, and he prosecuted the war with vigor. The Creeks were 
finally subdued ; and during the summer, several thousands of them were re- 
moved to their designated homes beyond the Mississippi. In October, Governca* 
Call, of Georgia, marched against the Seminoles with almost two thousand men. 
A detachment of upward of five hundred of these, had a severe contest [Nov. 
21] with the Indians at Wahoo Swamp, near the scene of Dade's massacre ; yet, 
like all other engagements with the savages in their swampy fastnesses, neither 
party could claim a positive victory." The year [1836] closed with no prospect 



' About forty miles north-east from the mouth of the Withlacoochee River, and eight south- 
west from Orange Lake. 

" Francis L. Dade was a native of Virginia. After the "War of 1812-15, ho was retained in the 
army, having risen from third lieutenant to major. A neat monument has been erected to the 
memory of himself and companions in death, at West Point, on the Hudson. 

' Near the upper waters of the Withlacoochee, about fifty miles north from Fort Brooke. Thiw« 
of the four survivors soon died of their wounds, and he who lived to tell the fearful narrative (Ran- 
som Clarke), afterward died from the effects of his injuries on that day. 

* On the southern borders of Alachua county, about sixty miles south-west from St. Augustine. 
Osceola scalped [note 4, page 14] General Thompson with his own hands, and thus enjoyed his re- 
venge for the indignity he had suffered. 

' Page 433. Edmtmd P. Gaines was born in Virginia in 1777, and entered the army in 1799. 
He was breveted a major-general in 1814, and presented by Congress with a gold medal for his gal- 
lantry at Fort Erie. He died in 1849. 

* South side of the river, in Dade county. The place where Gaines was assaulted is on the 
north side, in Alachua county. ' Page .^0. * Page 433. 

In this warfare the American troops suffered dreadfully from the poisonous vapors of the 
swamps, the bites of venomous serpents, and the stings of insects. The Indians were inaccessible 
in their homes amid the morasses, for the white people could not foUow them. 



468 THE NATION, [1829. 

of peace, either hy treaty or by the subjugation of the Indians. The war con- 
tinued through the winter. Finally, after some severe encounters with the 
United States troops, several chiefs appeared in the camp of General Jesup^ 
(who was then in supreme command) at Fort Dade,' and on the 6th of March, 
1837, they signed a treaty which guarantied immediate peace, and the instant 
departure of the Indians to their new home beyond the Mississippi. ' But the 
lull Avas temporary. The restless Osceola caused the treaty to be broken ; and 
during the summer of 1837, many more soldiers perished in the swamps while 
pursuing the Indians. At length, Osceola, with several chiefs and seventy 
warriors, appeared [Oct. 21] in Jessup's camp under the protection of a flag. 
They were seized and confined f and soon afterward, the brave chief was sent 
to Charleston, where he died of a fever, while immured in Fort Moultrie.* 
This was the hardest blow yet dealt upon the Seminoles ; but they continued to 
resist, notwiths* mding almost nine thousand United States troops were in their 
territory at the lose of 1837. 

On the 25th of December, a large body of Indians suflered a severe repulse 
on the northern border of IMacaco Lake,^ from six hundred troops under Colonel 
Zachary Taylor. ° That ofiicer had succeeded General Jesup, and for more than 
two years afterward, he endured every privation in efibrts to bring the war to a 
close. In May, 1839, a treaty was made which appeared to terminate the war ; 
but murder and robberies continued, and it was not until 1842 that peace was 
finally secured. This war, which lasted seven years, cost the United States 
many valuable lives, and millions of treasure. 

In the autumn of 1836, the election of a successor to President Jacksoi^ 
took place, and resulted in the choice of Martin Van Buren, of New York. 
Energy had marked every step of the career of Jackson as Chief Magistrate^ 
and at the close of his administration, the nation stood higher in the esteem of 
the world than it had ever done before. At the close of his first term, our 
foreign relations were very satisfactory, except with France. That government 
had agreed to pay about $5,000,000, by instalments, as indemnification for 
French spoliations on American commerce, under the operation of the several 
decrees of Napoleon, from 1806 to 1811.' The French government did not 
promptly comply with the agreement, and the President assumed a hostile tone, 
■which caused ^France to perform her duty. Similar claims against Portugal 

^ Thomas S. Jesup was born in Virginia in 1788. He was a brave and useful ofQcer during 
the war of 1812-15, and was retained in the army. He was breveted major-general in 182S, 
and was succeeded in command in Florida by Colonel Zachary Taylor, in 1838 He died at 
Washington city in 1858. 

« On the head waters of the Witlilachoochee, about forty miles north-east from Fort Brooke, at 
the head of Tampa Bay. See map on page 467. 

3 General Jesup was much censured for this breach of faith and the rules of honorable warfare. 
His excuse was the known treachery of Osceola, and a desire to put an end to bloodshed by what- 
ever means he might be able to employ. t -kt lu 

* On Sullivan's Island, upon the site of Fort SuUivan of the Revolution [page 249]. Near the 
entrance gate to the fort is a small monument erected to the memory of Osceola. 

^ Sometimes called Big Water Lake. The Indian name is O-ke-cho-bee, and by that title the 
battle is known. . , . 

• The brave leader in the Mexican War [page 481], and afterward President of the Umtea. 
States. Sea page 498. ' See pages 400 to 407, inclusive. 



I 



1837.] VAN BUREN'S ADMINISTRATION. 469 

were made, and payment obtained. A treaty of reciprocity had been concluded 
with Russia and Belgium, and everywhere the American flag commanded the 
highest respect. Two new States (Arkansas and Michigan) had been added to 
the Union. The original thirteen had doubled, and great activity prevailed in 
every part of the Republic. Satisfaction with the administration generally pre- 
vailed, and it Avas understood that Van Buren would continue the policy of hia 
predecessor, if elected. He received a large majority ; but the people, having 
failed to elect a Vice-President, the Senate chose Richard M. Johnson, of Ken- 
tucky, who had been a candidate with Van Buren, to fill that station. 

Much excitement was produced, and bitter feelings were engendered, toward 
President Jackson, by his last ofiicial act. A circular was issued from the 
Treasury department on the 11th of July. 1836, requiring all collectors of the 
public revenue to receive nothing but gold and silver in payment. This was 
intended to check speculations in the public lands, but it also bore heavily 
upon every kind of business. The "specie circular" was denounced; and so 
loud was the clamor, that toward the close of the session in 1837, both Houses 
of Congress adopted a partial repeal of it. Jackson refused to sign the bill, 
and by keeping it in his possession until after the adjournment of Congress, 
prevented it becoming a law. On the 4th of March, 1837, he retired from pub- 
lic life, to enjoy that repose which an exceedingly active career entitled him to. 
He was then seventy years of age. 



CHAPTER X. 

VAN BUREN'S ADMINISTRATION. [1837 — 18 41.] 

Martin Van Buren,' the eighth President of the United States, seemed 
to stand, at the time of his inauguration — on the 4th of March, 1837 — at the 
opening of a new era. All of his predecessors in the high office of Chief 
Magistrate of the Republic, had been descended of Britons, and were engaged' 
in the old struggle for Independence Van Buren was of Dutch descent, and 
was born after the great conflict had ended, and the birth of the nation had 
occurred. The day of his inauguration was a remarkably pleasant one. Seated 
by the side of the venerable Jackson, in a pha3ton made from the wood of the 
frigate Constitution, which had been presented to the President by his political 



' Martin Van Buren was bom at Kinderhook, Columbia county, New York, in December, 1782. 
He chose the profession of law. In 1815, he became Attornev-General 6f his native State, and in 
1828 was elected Governor of the same. Having? served his country in the Senate of the United 
States, he was appointed minister to Enojland in 1831, and was elected Vice-President of the 
United States in the autumn of 1832. Since his retirement from the presidency in 1841, Mr. Van 
Buren has spent a greater portion of his time on his estate in his native town. He visited Europe 
at the close of 1853, and was the first of the chief maofistrates of the Repubhc who crossed the 
Atlantic after their term of office had expired. Ex-President Fillmore followed his example in 
1^55, and spent several months abroad, ilr. Van liurcu IivlhI ui iviuoerliuok, alter his retire- 
ment from public life, until his death, on the 24th of July, 1862. 



470 



THE NATION. 



[183Y. 



friends in New York, he was escorted from the presidential mansion to the 
capitol bj a bodj of infantry and cavalry, and an immense assemblage of citi- 
zens. Upon a rostrum, erected on the ascent to the eastern portico of the cap- 
itol, he delivered his inaugural address, and took the prescribed oath of office, 
administered by Chief Justice Taney.' 




At the moment when Mr. Van Buren entered the presidential mansion aa- 
its occupant, the business of the country was on the verge of a terrible convul- 
sion and utter prostration. The distressing effects of the removal of the public 
funds from the United States Bank,' in 1883 and 1834, and the operations of 
the " specie circular," ^ had disappeared, in a measure, but as the remedies for 
the evil were superficial, the cure was only apparent. The chief remedy 
had been the free loaning of the public money to individuals by the State 
deposit banks ;* but a commercial disease was thus produced, more disastrous 
than the panic of 1833-34. A sudden expansion of the paper currency 
was the result. The State banks which accepted these deposits, supposed 
they would remain undisturbed until the government should need them 
for its use. Considering them as so much capital, they loaned their own 
funds freely. But in January, 1886. Congress authorized the Secretary of the 
Treasury to distribute all the public funds, except five millions of dollars, 
among the several States, according to their representation. The funds were 

' He appointed John Forsvth Secretary of State; Levi Woodbury, Secretary of the Treasury; 
Joel R. Poinsett Secretnrv of War; Mahlon Dickinson, Secretary of the Navy; Amos Kendall, 
Postmaster-Qeneral ; and Benjamin F. Butler, Attorney-General. All of them, except Mr. Poinsett,, 
held tlieir respective offices under President Jackson. 

» Page 465. s Page 469. * Page 466. 



1841.] TAN BUREN'S ADMINISTRATION 471 

accordingly taken from the deposit banks, after tlio 1st of January, 1837, and 
these banks being obliged to curtail their loans, a serious pecuniary embarrass- 
ment was produced. The immediate consequences of such multiplied facihties 
for obtaining bank loans, were an immensely increased importation of foreign 
goods, inordinate stimuLition of all industrial pursuits and internal improve- 
ments, and the operation of a spirit of speoulation, especially in real estate, 
which assumed the features of a mania, in 1836. A hundred cities were 
founded, and a thousand villages were ' ' laid out' ' on broad sheets of paper, and 
made the basis of vast money transactions. Borrowed capital was thus diverted 
from its sober, legitimate uses, to the fostering of schemes as unstable as water, 
and as unreal in their fancied results as di-eams of fairy-land. Overtrading 
and speculation, Avhich had relied for support upon continued bank loans, was 
suddenly checked by the necessary bank contractions, on account of the removal 
of the government funds from their custody ; and during ISlarch and April, 
1837, there were mercantile failures in the city of New York alone, to the 
amount of more than a hundred millions of dollars.' Fifteen months before 
[December, 1835], property to the amount of more than twenty millions of 
dollars had been destroyed by fire in the city of New York, when five hundred 
and twenty-nine buildings were consumed. The effects of these failures and 
losses were felt to the remotest borders of the Union, and credit and con- 
fidence were destroyed. 

Early in May, 1837, a deputation from the merchants and bankers of New 
Y'ork, waited upon the President, and solicited him to defer the collection of 
duties on imported goods, rescind the "specie circular," and to call an extra- 
ordinary session of Congress to adopt relief measures. The President declined 
to act on their petitions. When his determination was known, all the banks 
in New York suspended specie payments [May 10, 1837], and their example 
was speedily followed in Boston, Providence, Hartford, Albany, Philadelphia, 
Baltimore, and in smaller towns throughout the country. On the 16th of May 
the Legislature of New Y'^ork passed an act, authorizing the suspension of 
specie payments for one year. The measure embarrassed the general govern- 
ment, and it was unable to obtain gold and silver to discharge its own obliga- 
tions. The public good now demanded legislative relief, and an extraordinary 
session of Congress was convened by the President on the 4th of September. 
During a session of forty-three days, it did little for the general relief, except 
the passage of a bill authorizing the issue of treasury notes, not to exceed in 
amount ten millions of dollars." 

During the year 1837, the peaceful relations which had long existed between 
the United States and Great Britain, were somewhat disturbed by a revolution- 

* In two days, houses in New Orleans stopped payment, owing an aggregate of twenty-seven 
millions of dollars ; and in Boston one hundred and sixty-eight failures took place in six months. 

^ In his message to Congress at this session, the President proposed tlie establishment of an 
independent treasury, for the safe keeping of the public funds, and their entire and total separation 
from banking institutions. This scheme met with vehement opposition. The bill passed the Sen- 
ate, but was lost in the House. It was debated at subsequent sessions, and finally became a law 
on the 4th of July, 1840. This is known as the Sub-Treasury Scheme. 



472 THE NATION. [1837. 

ary movement in Canada which, at one time, seemed to promise a separation of 
that province from the British crown. The agitation and the outbreak appeared 
simultaneously in Upper and Lower Canada. In the former province, the most 
conspicuous leader was William Lyon M'Kenzie, a Scotchman, of rare abilities 
as a political writer and an agitator, and a republican in sentiment ; and in tho 
latter province, Louis Joseph Paf)ineau, a large land-owner, and a very influ- 
ential man among the French population. The movements of the Revolution- 
ary party were well planned, but local jealousies prevented unity of action, and 
the scheme failed. It was esteemed a highly patriotic effort to secure independ- 
mce and nationality for the people of the Canadas, and, as in the case of Cuba, 
at a later period,' the warmest sympathies of the Americans were enlisted, 
especially at the North. Banded companies and individuals joined the rebels ;' 
and so general became this active sympathy on the northern frontier, that peace 
between the two governments was jeoparded. President Van Buren issued a 
proclamation, calling upon all persons engaged in the schemes of invasion of 
Canada, to abandon the design, and warning them to beware of the penalties 
that must assuredly follow such infractions of international laws. In 1838, 
General Scott was sent to the frontier to preserve order, and was assisted by 
proclamations of the Governor of New York. Yet secret revolutionary associ- 
ations, called "Hunter's Lodges," continued for a long time. For about four 
years, that cloud hung upon our northern horizon, when, in September, 1841, 
President Tyler issued an admonitory proclamation, specially directed to the 
members of the Hunter's Lodges, which prevented further aggressive move- 
ments. The leaders of the revolt were either dead or in exile, and quiet was 
restored. 

While this excitement was at its height, long disputes concerning the bound- 
ary between the State of Maine and the British province of Now Brunswick, 
ripened into armed preparations for settling the matter by combat. This, too, 
threatened danger to the peaceful relations between the two governments. The 
President sent General Scott to the theater of the dispute, in the winter of 
1839, and by his wise and conciliatory measures, he prevented bloodshed, and 
produced quiet. The whole matter was finally settled by a treaty [August 20, 
1842], negotiated at Washington City, by Daniel Webster for the United 
States, and Lord Ashburton for Great Britain. The latter had been sent as 
special minister for the purpose. Besides settling the boundary question, this 
agreement, known as the Ashburton Treaty, provided for the final suppression 
of the slave-trade, and for the giving up of criminal fugitives from justice, in 
certain cases. 

A new presidential election now approached. On the 5th of May. 1840, a 

' Page 502. 

' A party of Americans took possession of Navy Island, situated in the Niagara River about 
two miles above the Falls, and belonging to Canada. They numbered seven hundred strong, well 
provisioned, and provided with twenty pieces of cannon. They had a small steamboat named 
Caroline, to ply between Schlosser, on the American side, and Navy Island. On a dark night in 
December, 1837, a party of royalists from the Canada shore crossed over, cut the Caroline loose, 
set her on fire, and she went over the great cataract while in full blaze. It was believed that soma 
persons were on board the vessel at the time. 



1841.] HARRISON'S AND TYLER'S ADMINISTRATION. 473 

national Democratic convention assembled at Baltimore, and unanimously nom- 
inated Mr. Van Buren for President. No nomination was made for Vice-Pres- 
ident, but soon afterward, Richard M. Johnson' and James K. Polk were 
selected as candidates for that office, in different States. A national Whig^ con- 
vention had been held at Harrisburg, in Pennsylvania, on the 4th of December 
previous [1839], when General William H. Harrison, of Ohio, the popular 
leader in the North-West, in the War of 1812,' was nominated for President, 
and John Tyler, of Virginia, for Vice-President. Never, before, Avas the 
country so excited by an election, and never before was a presidential contest 
characterized by such demoralizing proceedings.* The government, under Mr. 
Van Buren, being held responsible by the opposition for the business depres- 
sion which yet brooded over the country, public speakers arrayed vast masses 
of the people against the President, and Harrison and Tyler were elected by 
overwhelming majorities. And now, at the close of the first fifty years of the 
Republic, the population had increased from three and a half millions, of all 
colors, to seventeen millions. A magazine writer of the day,^ in comparing 
several administrations, remarked that "The great events of Mr. Van Buren's 
administration, by which it will hereafter be known and designated, is the 
divorce of bank and State'^ in the fiscal affairs ofthe National government, and 
the return, after half a century of deviation, to the original design of the Con- 
stitution." 



CHAPTER XI. 

HARRISON'S AND TYLER'S ADMINISTRATION. [1841—1845.] 

The city of Washington was thronged with people from every State in the 
Union, on the 4th of March, 1841, to witness the ceremonies ofthe inauguration of 
General William Henry Harrison,' the ninth President of the United States. He 

* Page 424. ' Note 2, page 466. ^ Pages 416 to 424, inclusive. 

* Because General Harrison lived in the "West, and his residence was associated with pioneer 
life, a log-cabin became the symbol of his party. These cabins were erected all over the country, 
in which meetings were held ; and, as the hospitality of the old hero was symbolized by a barrel 
of cider, made free to aU visiters or strangers, who " never found the latch-string of his log-cabin 
drawn in," that beverage was dealt out unsparinglj^ to all who attended the meetings in the cabins. 
These meetings were scenes of carousal, deeply injurious to all who participated in them, and 
•specially to the young. Thousands of drunkards, in after years, dated their departure from sobri- 
ety tj the "Hard Cider" campaign of 1840. 

^ Democratic Review, AprO, 1840. 

* This is in allusion to the sub-treasury scheme. Mr. Van Buren remarked to a friend, just 
previous to sending his message to Congress, in which he proposed that plan for collecting and 
keeping the public moneys : " We can not know how the immediate convulsion may result ; but 
the people will, at all events, eventually come right, and posterity at least will do me justice. Be 
the present issue for good or for evil, it is for posterity that I will write this message." 

' William Henry Harrison, son of one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, was 
bom near the banks ofthe James River, in Charles City county, Virginia, in February, 1773. He 
was educated at Hampden Sydney College, and was prepared, by studies, for a physician, but en- 
tered the army as ensign in the United States artillery, in 1791. He was Secretary ofthe North- 



474 



THK X AT I OX 



[1841 



was then an old naan, having passed almost a month beyond the age of sixty-eight 
years. Yet there was a vigor in his movements quite remarkable for one of 
that age, and who had passed through so many hardships and physical labors. 
From a platform over the ascent to the eastern portico of the Capitol, where 
Mr. Van Buren delivered his inaugural address, General Harrison, in a clear 




yU^ }:^ /fa^^i^^^vh^ 



voice, read his. He was frequently interrupted by cheers during the reading. 
When it was concluded, Chief Justice Taney administered the oath of office, and 
three successive cannon peals announced the fact that the Republic had a new 
President. Harrison immediately nominated his cabinet officers.' and these 
were all confirmed by the Senate, then in session. 

President Harrison's inaugural speech was well received by all parties, and 
the dawn of his administration gave omens of a brighter day for the country. 
When his Address went over the land, and the wisdom of his choice of cabinet 



western Territory in 1797; and at the age of twenty-six years, was elected thie first delegate to 
Congress from that domain. He was afterward appointed governor of Indiana Territory, and was 
very active during the War of 1812. See pages 416 to 424 inclusive. At its close he retired to 
'lis farm at North Bend, on the banks of the Ohio. He served in the national council for four 
years [1824 to 1828] as United States senator, when he was appointed minister to Colombia, one of 
the South American republics. He was finally raised to the highest post of honor in the nation. 
His last disease was pneumonia, or bilious pleurisy, which terminated his life in a few days. His 
last words were (thinking he was addressing his successor in office): "Sir, I wish you to under- 
stand the principles of the government. I wish them carried out. I ask nothing more." 

' Daniel Webster, Secretary of State ; Thomas Ewing, Secretary of the Treasury ; John Bell, 
Secretary of War ; George E. Badger. Secretary of the Navy ; Francis Granger, Postmaster-Gen- 
eral; and J. J. Crittenden, Attorney-General. 



1845.] TYLER'S ADMINISTRATION. 475 

counselors was known, prosperity was half restored, for confidence was re- 
enthroned in the commercial world. But all the hopes which centered in the 
new President were soon extinguished, and the anthems of the inaugural day 
wefe speedily changed to solemn requiems. Precisely one month after he uttered 
his oath of office, the new President died. That sad event occurred on the 4th 
day of April, 1841. Before he had fairly placed his hand upon the machinery of 
the government, it was paralyzed, and the only official act of general importance 
performed by President Harrison during his brief administration, was the issu- 
ing of a proclamation, on the 17th of March, calling an extraprdinary session 
of Congress, to commence at the close of the following May, to legislate upon 
the subjects of finance and revenue.' 

In accordance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Vice-President 
became the official successor of the deceased President ; and on the 6th of April 
the oath of office was administered to 

JOHN T Y L E R .^ 

He retained the cabinet appointed by President Harrison until September fol- 
lowing, when all but the Secretary of State resigned.^ 

The extraordinary session of Congress called by President Harrison, com- 
menced its session on the appointed day [May 31, 1841], and continued until 
the 13th of September following. The Sub-Treasury act' was repealed, and a 
general Bankrupt law was enacted. This humane law accomplished a material 
benefit. Thousands of honest and enterprising men had been crushed by the 

' The predecessors of Harrison had called extraordinary sessions of Congress, as follows : John 
Adams, on the 16th of May, 1797 ; Thomas Jefiferson, on the 17th of October, 1808, to provide for 
carrying the treaty of Louisiana into eflect; James Madison, on the 23d of May, 1809, and also on 
the 25th of May, 1813; and Martin Yan Buren, on the 4th of September, 1837. * 

' On the 4th of AprU, the members of Harrison's cabinet dispatched Fletcher "Webster, chief 
clerk in the State Department, with a letter to Mr. Tyler, announcing the death of the President. 
Mr. Tyler was then at Williamsburg. So great was the dispatch, both by the messenger and the 
Vice-President, that the latter arrived in Washington on Tuesday morning, the 6th of April, at four 
o'clock. As doubts might arise concerning the validity of his oath of oifice as Vice-President, while 
acting as President, Mr. Tyler took the oath anew, as Chief Magistrate, before Judge Cranch, of 
Washington city. On the following day he attended the funeral of President Harrison. John 
Tyler was born in Charles City county, Virginia, in March, 1790. He was so precocious that he 
entered William and Mary College at the age of twelve years. He graduated at the age of seven- 
teen, studied law, and at nineteen he was a practicing lawyer. At the age of twenty he was 
elected a member of the Virginia Legislature, where he served for several years. He was elected 
to Congress to fill a vacancy caused by death, in 1816, when only twenty-six years of age. He was 
there again in 1819. In 1825 he was elected governor of Virginia. He was afterward sent to the 
Senate of the United States; and he was much in public hfe until the close of his Presidential ca- 
reer. He took part with tlie pnt>mies of the Republic in the late Civil War, and died in Rich- 
mond, Virginia, on the isth of J.iuuarj^, ISGi. 

' He then appointed Walter Forward, Secretary of the Treasury ; John C. Spencer, Secretary 
of War; Abel P. Upshur, Secretary of the Navy; Charles A. WieklifTe, Postmaster-General; and 
Hugh S. Legar^, Attorney-General. Mr. Tyler had the misfortune to lose three of his cabinet of- 
ficers, by death, in the course of a few montlis. Mr. Legarc accompanied the President to Boston, 
on the occasion of celebrating the completion of the Bunker Hill monument [page 235], in .June, 
1843, and died there On the 28th of February following, the bursting of a gun on board the steam- 
ship Princeton, while on an excursion upon the Potomac, killed Mr. Upsliur, then Secretari^ of State ; 
Mr. Gilmer, Secretary of the Navy; and several other distinguished gentlemen. The President and 
many ladies were on board. Among tlie killed was Mr. Gardiner, of the State of New York, 
whose daughter the President soon afterward married. * Note 2, page 471. 



476 THE N ATI ox. [1841. 

recent business revulsion, and were so laden with debt as to be hopelessly 
chained to a narrow sphere of action. The law relieved them ; and while it 
bore heavily upon the creditor class, for a while, its operations were beneficent 
and useful. When dishonest men began to make it a pretense for cheating, it 
was repealed. But the chief object sought to be obtained during this session, 




namely, the chartering of a Bank of the United States, was not aohieved. Two 
separate bills' for that purpose were vetoed' by the President, who, like Jack- 
son, thought be perceived great evils to be apprehended from the workings of 
such an institution. The course of the President Avas vehemently censured by 
the party in power, and the last veto led to the dissolution of his cabinet. Mr. 
Webster patriotically remained at his post, for great public interests would have 
suffered by his withdrawal, at that time. 

The year 1842 (second of Mr. Tyler's administration) was distinguished by 
the return of the United States Exploring Expedition ; the settlement of the 
North-eastern boundary question: essential modifications of the tariff; and 
domestic difficulties in Rhode Island. The exploring expedition, commanded by 
Lieutenant Wilkes, of the United States navy, had been sent, several years be- 
fore, to traverse and explore the great southern ocean. It coasted along what 

' One was passed on the 6th of August, 1841 ; the other, modified so as to meet the Presi- 
dent's objections, as it was believed, passed September 9th. ' Note 6, page 462. 



1845.] TYLER'S ADMIXI S T R ATION. 477 

is supposed to be an Antarctic contiuent, for seventeen hundred miles in the 
vicinity of latitude 66 degrees south, and between longitude 96 and 154 degrees 
east. The expedition brought home a great many curiosities of island human 
life, and a large number of fine specimens of natural history, all of which are 
now [1883] well preserved in the custody of the National Institute, Smithsonian 
building, in AYashington city. The expedition made a voyage of about ninety 
thousand miles, equal to almost four times the circumference of the globe. 

The modifications of the tariff were important. By the compromise act of 
1832,' duties on foreign goods were to reach the minimum of reduction at the 
close of 1842, when the tariflf would only jirovide revemie, not jv^otectioji to 
maym/actures, ]ike that of 1S28" The latter object appeared desirable; and 
by an act passed on the 29th of Jime, 1842, high tariffs were imposed on 
many foreign articles. The President vetoed it; but a bill, less objectionable, 
received his assent on the Otli of August. 

The difficulties in Rhode Island originated in a movement to adopt a 
State Constitution of government, and to abandon the old charter given by 
Charles the Second,^ in 1663, under which the people had been ruled for one 
hundred and eighty years. Disputes arose concerning the proper method to be 
pursued in making the change, and these assumed a serious aspect. Two par- 
ties were formed, known, respectively, as the "suffrage." or radical party; the 
other as the " law and order," or conservative party. Each formed a Constitu- 
tion, elected a governor and legislature,^ and finally armed [May and June, 
1843] in defense of their respective claims. The State was on«the verge of 
civil war, and the aid of National troops had to be invoked, to restore quiet and 
order. A free Constitution, adopted by the " law and order" party in Novem- 
ber, 1842, to go into operation on the first Tuesday in May, 1843, was sus- 
tained, and became the law of the land. 

During the last year of President Tyler's administration, the country was 
much agitated by discussions concerning the proposed admission of the independ- 
ent republic of Texas, on our south-west frontier, as a State of the Union. 
The proposition was warmly opposed at the North, because the annexation 
would increase the area and political strength of slavery, and lead to a war with 
Mexico." A treaty for admission, signed at Washington on the 12th of April, 

' Page 464. « Page 459. ^ Page 158. 

* The " suffrage" party elected Thomas W. Dorr, governor, and the " law and order" party 
chose Samuel W. King for chief magistrate. Dorr was finally arrested, tried for and convicted of 
treason, and sentenced to imprisonment for life. The excitement having passed away, in a meas- 
ure, he was released in June, 1845, but was deprived of aU the civil rights of a citizen. These dis- 
abilities were removed in the autumn of 1853. 

' Texas was a part of the domain of that ancient Mexico conquered by Cortez [page 43]. In 
1824, Mexico became a republic under Generals Victoria and Santa Anna, and was divided into 
States united by a Federal Constitution. One of these was Texas, a territory which was origin- 
ally claimed by the United States as a part of Louisiana, purchased [page 390] from France in 
1803, but ceded to Spain in 1820. In 1821-22, a colony from the United States, under Stephen 
F. Austin, made a settlement on both sides of the Colorado River : and the Spanish government 
favoring immigration thither, caused a rapid increase in the population. There were ten thousand 
Americans in that province in 1833. Santa Anna became military dictator ; and the people of 
Texas, unwilling to submit to his arbitrary rule, rebelled. A war ensued ; and on the 2d of March, 
1836. a convention declared Texas independent. Much bloodshed occurred afterward ; but a final 



478 THE NATION. [1845. 

1844, was rejected by the Senate on the 8th of June following. To the next 
Congress the proposition was presented in the form of a joint resolution, and 
received the concurrence of both Houses on the 1st of March, 1845, and 
the assent of the President on the same day. This measure had an important 
bearing upon the Presidential election in 1844. It became more and more pop- 
ular with the people throughout the Union, and James K. Polk, of Tennessee, 
who was pledged in favor of the measure, was nominated for the office of Pres- 
ident of the United States, by the National Democratic Convention, assembled 
at Baltimore on the 27th of May, 1844. George M. Dallas was nominated for 
Vice-President at the same time ; and in November following, they were both 
elected. The opposing candidates were Henry Clay and Theodore Frelinghuy- 
sen. The last important official act of President Tyler was the signing, on the 
3d of March, 1845, of the bill for the admission of Florida and Iowa into the 
Union of States. 



CHAPTER XII. 

POLK'S ADMINISTRATION. [18 45 — 1849.] 

Never before had so large a concourse of people assembled at the National 
city, to witness the inauguration of a new Chief Magistrate of the nation, as on the 
4th of March, 1845, when James Knox Polk, ' of Tennessee, the tenth President of 
the United States, took the oath of office, administered by Chief Justice Taney. 
The day was unpleasant. A lowering morning preceded a rainy day, and the 
pleasures of the occasion were marred thereby. The address of the President, 
on that occasion, clearly indicated that energetic policy which distinguished his 
administration. On the day of his inauguration he nominated his cabinet 
officers," and the Senate being in session, immediately confirmed them. 

Among the most important topics which claimed the attention of the admin- 
istration, were the annexation of Texas, and the claims of Great Britain to a 
large portion of the vast territory of Oregon, on the Pacific coast. The former 

hattle of San Jacinto, in whieli the Texans were led by General Sam Houston, afterward a 
United States Senator from Texas, vindicated the position the people had taken, and terminated 
the strife. Texas remained an independent republic imtil its admission into our National Union 
in 1845. 

' James K. Polk was bom in Mecklenburg county, North Carolina, in November, 1795. "While 
Tie was a child, his father settled in Tennessee ; and "the first appearance of young Polk in public 
life, was as a member of the Tennessee Legislature, in 1823. He had been admitted to the bar 
three years before, but public life kept him from the practice of his profession, except at intervala 
Ho was elected to Congress in 1825, and was in that V)ody almost continually until elevated to the 
Presidential chair. He was elected Speaker of the House of Representatives in 1835, and contin- 
ued in the performance of the duties of that office during five consecutive sessions. He was elected 
governor of Tennessee in 1839, and President of the United States in 1844. He retired to his 
residence, near Knoxville, Tennessee, at the close of his term, in 1849, and died there in June of 
the same year. ttt-,,- 

"" James Buchanan, Secretary of State; Robert J. Walker, Secretary of the Treasury; WiUiam 
L. Marcy, Secretary of War; George Bancroft, Secretary of the Navy; Cave Johnson, Po-— *- 
General ; and John T. Mason, Attorney-General 



1849.] 



POLK'S ADMINISTRATION. 



479 



demanded and received the earliest consideration. On the last day of his offi- 
cial term, President Tyler had sent a messenger to the Texan Government, 
-with a copy of the joint resolutions of the American Congress/ in ilivor of an- 
nexation. These were considered by a convention of delegates, called for the 
purpose of forming a State Constitution for Texas. That body approved of the 
measure, by resolution, on the 4th of July, 1845. On that day Texas became 




Dne of the States of our Republic. The other momentous subject (ohe claims 
of Great Britain to certain portions of Oregon), also received prompt atten- 
tion. That vast territory, between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific, 
had been, for some time, a subject of dispute between the two countries." In 
1818, it was mutually agreed that each nation should equally enjoy the privileges 
of all the bays and harbors on the coast, for ten years. This agreement was re- 
newed in 1827, for an indefinite time, with the stipulation, that either party 
might rescind it by giving the other party twelve months' notice. Smch notice 



* The communication was made throus:h A. J. Dnnelson, the " American" candidate for Vice- 
President of the United States, in 1856, who was our Charge dAffaires to the Texan Government. 

* Captain Grey, of Boston, entered the mouth of the Columbia River in 1792, and Captains 
Lewis and Chirke explored that region, from the Rocky Mountains westward, in 1804-'5. In 1811, 
the late J. J. Astor established a trading station at the mouth of the Columbia River. The British 
doctrine, always practiced by them, that the entrance of a vessel of a civilized nation into the 
mouth of a river, gives title, by the right of discovery, to the territory watered by that river and 
its tributaries, clearly gave Oregon to 54 degrees 40 mmutes, to the Upited States, for the dis- 
covery of Captain Grey, in 1792, was not disputed. 



480 THE NATION. [1845. 

was given by the United States in 1846, and the boundary was then fixed by 
treaty, made at Washington city, in June of that year. Great Britain claimed 
the whole territory to 54 40' north latitude, the right to which was disputed 
by the United States. The boundary line was finally fixed at latitude 49^ ; 
and in 1848, a territorial government was established. In March, 1853, Ore- 
gon was divided, and the north 3rn portion was made a separate domain, by the 
title of Washington Territory. 

The annexation of Texas, as had been predicted, caused an immediate rup- 
ture between the United States and Mexico ; for the latter claimed Texas as a 
part of its territory, notwithstanding its independence had been acknowledged 
by the United States, England, France, and other governments. Soon after 
[March 6, 1845] Congress had adopted the joint resolution for the admission 
of that State into the Union, ^ General Almonte, the Mexican minister at Wash- 
ington, formally protested against that measure, and demanded his passports. 
On the 4th of Juno following, General Herrera, President of ISIexico, issued a 
proclamation, declaring the rights of Mexico, and his determination to defend 
them — by arms, if necessary. But, independent of the act complained of, there 
already existed a cause for serious disputes between the United States and 
Mexico.' Ever since the establishment of republican govei-nment by the latter, 
in 1824, it had been an unjust and injurious neighbor. Impoverished by civil 
wars, its authorities did not hesitate to replenish its Treasury by plundering 
American vessels in the Gulf of Mexico, or by confiscating the property of 
American merchants within its borders. The United States government 
remonstrated in vain, until, in 1831, a treaty was formed, and promises of 
redress were made. But aggressions continued ; and in 1840, the aggregate 
amount of American property which had been appropriated by Mexicans, was 
more than six millions of dollars. The claim for this amount remained unset- 
tled' when the annexation of Texas occurred [July 4, 1845], and peaceful 
relations between the two governments were suspended. 

The President being fully aware of the hostile feelings of the Mexicans, 
ordered [July] General Zachary Taylor,* then in command of troops in the 
South- West, to proceed to Texas, and take a position as near the Rio Grande,^ 
as prudence would allow. This force, about fifteen hundred strong, was called 
the "Army of Occupation," for the defense of Texas. At the same time, a 
strong squadron, under Commodore Conner, sailed for the Gulf of Mexico, to 
protect American interests there. General Taylor first landed on the 25th of 
July on St. Joseph's Island," and then embarked for Corpus Christi, a Mexican 

' Page 478. * Pronounced May-hee-co by the Spaniards. 

^ Commissioners appointed by the two governments to adjust these claims, met in 1840. The 
Mexican commissioners acknowledged two millions of dollars, and no more. In 1843 the whole 
amount was acknowledp'ed by Mexico, and the payment was to be made in instalments of three 
hundred thousand dollars each. Only three of these instalments bad been paid in 1845, and the 
Mexican government refused to decide whether the remainder should be settled or not. 

* Taylor's actual rank in the army list was only that of Colonel. He had been made a Brig- 
adier-General by }>revet, for his good conduct in the Florida "War [page 468]. A title by brevet is 
only honorary. Taylor held the title of Brigadier-General, but received only the pay of a Colonel. 

' Great or Grand river. Also called Bio Bravo del Norte — Brave North river. 

• There the flag of the United States was first displayed in power over Texas soil 



1849.] POLK'S ADMINISTRATION. 481 

village bejond the Nueces, and near its mouth. There he formed a camp 
[September, 1845], and remained during the succeeding autumn and winter. 
It was during the gathering of this storm of war on our south-western frontier, 
that the difficulties with Great Britain, concerning Oregon, occurred, which we 
have already considered. 

By a dispatch dated January 13, 184G, the Secretary of War ordered Gen- 
eral Taylor to advance from Corpus Christi to near the mouth of the Rio 
Grande, opposite the Spanish city of Matamoras, because Mexican troops were 
then gathering in that direction, with the evident intention of invading Texas. 
This was disputed territory between Texas and the Mexican province of Tamau' 
lipas ; and when, on the 25th of March, he encamped at Point Isabel, on the coast, 
about twenty-eight miles from Matamoras, General Taylor was warned by the 
Mexicans that he was upon foreign soil. Regardless of menaces, he left his stores 
at Point Isabel, under Major Monroe and four hundred and fifty men, and with the 
remainder of his army advanced [March 28, 1846] to the bank of the Rio Grande, 
where he established a fortified camp, and commenced the erection of a fort.' 

President Herrera's desire for peace with the United States made him un- 
popular, and the Mexican people elected General Paredes" to succeed him. 
That officer immediately dispatched General Ampudia^ with a large force, to 
Matamoras, to drive the Americans beyond the Nueces. Ampudia arrived on 
the 11th of April, 1846, and the next day he sent a letter to General Taylor, 
demanding his withdrawal within twenty-four hours. Taylor refused compli- 
ance, and continued to strengthen his camp. Ampudia hesitated ; and on tho 
24th of that month he was succeeded in command by the more energetic 
Arista,* the commander-in-chief of the northern division of the army of Mexico, 
whose reported reinforcements made it probable that some decisive action would 
soon take place. This change of affiiirs was unfavorable to the Americans, and 
the situation of the "Army of Occupation" was now becoming very critical. 
Parties of armed Mexicans had got between Taylor and his stores at Point 
Isabel, and had cut off all inter-communication. Arista's army was hourly 
gathering strength ; and already an American reconnoitering party, under 
Captain Thornton," had been killed or captured [April 24] on the Texas side of 
the Rio Grande. This was the first blood shed in 

THE WAR WITH MEXICO. 

When he had nearly completed the fort opposite Matamoras, General Tay- 
lor hastened [May 1], with his army, to the relief of Point Isabel, which was 
menaced by a large Mexican force' collected in his rear. He left a regiment 

* It was named Fort Crown, in honor of Major Brown, the officer in command there. It was 
erected under the superintendence of Captain Mansfield, and was large enough to accommodate 
about two thousand men. ^ Pronounced Pa-ray-dhes. 

^ Pronounced Am-poo-dhee-ah. * Pronounced Ah-rees-tah. 

^ General Taylor had been informed that a body of Mexican troops were crossing the Rio 
Grande, above his encampment, and he sent Captain Thornton, with sixty dragoons, to reconnoitre. 
They were surprised and captured. Sixteen Americans were killed, and Captain Thornton escaped 
by an extraordinary leap of his horse. 

* General Taylor was apprised of this force of fifteen hundred Mexicans, by Captain Walker, 

31 



482 T Tl E X A T T O X. [1845. 

of infantry and two companies of artillery, under Major Brown (in whose 
honor, as we have just observed, the fortification was named), to defend the 
fort, and reached Point Isabel the same day, without molestation. This 
departure produced great joy in INIatamoras, for the Mexicans regarded it as a 
cowardly retreat. Preparations were immediately made to attack Fort Brown ; 
and on the morning of the 3d of May [1846], a battery at Matamoras opened 
a heavy cannonade and bombardment upon it, while quite a large body of 
troops crossed the river, to attack it in the rear. General Taylor had left 
orders that, in the event of an attack, and aid being required, heavy signal-guns 
should be fired at the fort. For a long time the little garrison made a noble 
defense, and silenced the Mexican battery ; but when, finally, the enemy gath- 
ered in strength in the rear, and commenced planting cannons, and the heroic 
Major Brown was mortally wounded,' the signals were given [May 6], and 
Taylor prepared to march for the Rio Grande. He left Point Isabel on the 
evening of the 7th, with a little more than two thousand men, having been 
reinforced by Texas volunteers, and marines from the American fleet then 
blockading the mouth of the Rio Grande. At noon, the next day [May 8J, 
they discovered a Mexican army, under Arista, full six thousand strong, drawn 
up in battle array upon a portion of a prairie flanked by ponds of water, and 
beautified by trees, which gave it the name of Palo Alto. As soon as his men 
could take refreshments, Taylor formed his army, and pressed forward to the 
attack. For five hours a hot contest was maintained, when, at twilight, the 
JMexicans gave way and fled, and victory, thorough and complete, was with the 
Americans. It had been an afternoon of terrible excitement and fatigue, and 
when the firing ceased, the victors sank exhausted upon the ground. They had 
lost, in killed and wounded, fifty-three ;" the Mexicans lost about six hundred. 
At two o'clock in the morning of the 9th of May, the deep slumbers of the 
little army were broken by a summons to renew the march for Fort Brown. 
They saw no traces of the enemy until toward evening, when they discovered 
them strongly posted in a ravine, called Resaca de la Palma,' drawn up in 
battle order. A shorter, but bloodier conflict than that at Palo Alto, the pre- 
vious day, ensued, and again the Americans were victorious. They lost, in 
killed and wounded, one hundred and ten ; the Mexican loss was at least one 
thousand. General La Vega* and a hundred men were made prisoners, and 

the celebrated Texas Ranger, who had been employed by Alajor Monroe to keep open a communi- 
cation between Point Isabel and Taylor's camp. Walker had fought them with liis single company, 
armed with revolving pistols, and after kilhng thirty, escaped, and, with six of his men, reached 
Taylor's camp. 

* He lost a leg by the bursting of a bomb-shell [note 2, page 296], and died on the 9th of May, 
He was born in Massachusetts in 1788 ; was in the war of 1812 ; was promoted to Major in 1843 j 
and was fifty-eight years of age when he died. 

^ Among the fatally wounded was Captain Page, a native of Maine, who died on the 12th of 
July following, at, the age of forty-nine years. Also, Major Ringgold, commander of the Flying 
Artillery, who died at Point Isabel, four days afterward, at the age of forty-six years. 

* Pronounced Ray-sah-kah day la Pal-mah, or Dry River of Palms. The ravine is supposed to 
be the bed of a dried-up stream. The spot is on the northerly side of the Rio Grande, about three 
miles from Matamoras. In this engagement, Taylor's force was about one thousand seven hundred ; 
Arista had been reinforced, and had about seven thousand men. 

* Lay Vay-goh. He was a brave oflQcer, and was captured by Captain May, who, rising in his 



1849.] POLK'S ADMINISTRATION. 483 

eight pieces of cannon, three standards, and a quantity of military stores, were 
captured. The Mexican army was completely broken up. Arista saved him- 
self by solitary flight, and made his way alone across the Rio Grande. After 
suffering a bombardment for one hundred and sixty hours, the garrison at Fort 
Brown were relieved, and the terrified Mexicans were trembling for the safety 
of Matamoras. 

When intelligence of the first bloodshed, in the attack upon Captain Thorn- 
ton and his party, on the 24th of April, and a knowledge of the critical situa- 
tion of the little Army of Occupation, reached New Orleans, and spread over 
the land, the whole country was aroused ; and before the battles of Palo Alto 
and Resaca de la Palma [jNIay 8, 9] were known in the States, Congress had 
declared [May 11, 1846] that, "by the act of the Republic of Mexico, a state 
of war exists between that government and the United States ;" authorized the 
President to raise fifty thousand volunteers, and appropriated ten millions of 
dollars [May 13] toward carrying on the contest. Within two days, the Sec- 
retary of War and General Scott' planned [May 15] a campaign, greater in the 
territorial extent of its proposed operations, than any recorded in history. A 
fleet was to sweep around Cape Horn, and attack the Pacific coast of Mexico ; 
^n " Army of the West" was to gather at Fort Leavenworth,^ invade New 
Mexico, and co-operate with the Pacific fleet ; and an "Army of the Center" 
was to rendezvous in the heart of Texas,^ to invade Old Mexico from the north. 
On the 23d of the same month [May], the Mexican government made a formal 
declaration of war against the United States. 

When news of the two brilliant victories reached the States, a thrill of joy 
went throughout the land, and bonfires, illummations, orations, and the thunder 
of cannons, were seen and heard in all the great cities. In the mean while, 
General Taylor was in Mexico, preparing for other brilliant victories.* He 
crossed the Rio Grande, drove the Mexican troops from Matamoras, and took 
possession of that town on the 18th of May. There he remained until the close 
of August, receiving orders from government, and reinforcements, and prepar- 
ing to march into the interior. The first division of his army, under General 
Worth," moved toward Monterey*^ on the 20th. Taylor, with the remainder (in 
all, more than six thousand men), followed on the 3d of September; and on 
the 19th, the whole army^ encamped within three miles of the doomed city, then 

stirrups, shouted, "Remember your regiment I Men, follow!" and, with his dragoons, rushed for- 
ward in the face of a heavy fire from a battery, captured La Vega, killed or dispersed the gunners, 
and took possession of the cannons. ^ Page 485. 

^ A strong United States post on the southern bank of the Missouri River, on the borders of 
the Great Plains. These plains extend to the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains. 

' At San Antonia de Bexar, the center of Austin's settlement [note 5, page 477], south of the 
Colorado river. 

* On the 30th of May he was rewarded for his skill and bravery by a commission as Major- 
General, by brevet. See note 4, page 480. 

' "William J. Worth was born in Columbia county, New York, in 1794. He was a gallant soldier 
during the "War of 1812-15; was retained in the army, and for his gallantry at Monterey, was 
made a Major-General by brevet, and received the gift of a sword from Congress. Ho was of great 
eervice during the whole war with Mexico. He died in Texas in May, 1849. 

' Pronounced Mon-tar-ray. It is the capital of New Leon. 

^ The principal officers with General Taylor, at this tune, were Generals "Worth, Quitman, 
Twiggs, Butler, Henderson, and Hamer. 



484 TJ^E NATION. [1845. 

defended bj General Ampudia/ with more than nine thousand troops. It was 
a strongly built town, at the foot of the great Sierra Madre, well fortified bj 
both nature and art, and presented a formidable obstacle in the march of the* 
victor toward the interior. But having secured the Saltillo road,° by v/hich 
supplies for the Mexicans in Monterey were to be obtained, General Taylor 
commenced a siege on the 21st of September. The conflict continued almost 
four days, a part of the time within the streets of the city, where the carnago 
was dreadful. Amnudia surrendered the town and garrison on the fourth day* 
[September 24], and leaving General Worth in command there, General Tay- 
lor encamped at Walnut Springs, three miles distant, and awaited further 
orders from his government.* 

When Congress made the declaration of war, and authorized the raising of 
an army from the great body of the people, General Woo? was commissioned 
to muster and prepare for service, the gathering volunteers. He performed 
this duty so promptly, that by the middle of July, twelve thousand of them 
had been inspected, and mustered into service. Nine thousand of them were 
sent to the Rio Grande, to reinforce General Taylor, and the remainder 
repaired to Bexar," in Texas, where they were disciplined by General Wool, in 
person, preparatory to marching into the province of Chihuahua," in the heart 
of Mexico. Wool went up the Rio Grande with about three thousand men, 
crossed the river at Presidio, and on the last day of October, reached Monclova, 
seventy miles north-west from Monterey. His kindness to the people won their 
confidence and esteem, and he was regarded as a friend. There he was informed 
of the capture of Monterey, and guided by the advice of General Taylor, he 
abandoned the project of penetrating Chihuahua, and marched to the fertile dis- 
trict of Parras, in Coahuila, where he obtained ample supplies for his own and 
Taylor's forces. 

The armistice' at Monterey ceased on the loth of November, by order of 
the United States government. General Worth, with nine hundred men, took 
possession of Saltillo [November 15, 1846], the capital of Coahuila,' and Gen- 
eral Taylor, leaving General Butler in command at Monterey, marched for 
Victoria, the capital of Tamaulipas, with the intention of attacking Tampico, 

» Page 481. 

* This road passed through the mountains along the San Juan river, and is the only commu- 
nication between Monterey and the fertile provinces of Coahuila and Durango. The command of 
this road was obtained after a severe contest with Mexican cavalry, on the 20th of May, by a party 
under General Worth. 

^ The Mexican soldiers were permitted to march out with the honors of war; and, being short 
of provisions, and assured that Santa Anna, now at the head of the Mexicans, desired peace, Gen- 
eral Taylor agreed to a cessation of hostihties for eight weeks, if permitted by his government. 

* The Americans lost in killed, wounded, and missing, five Inmdred and sixty-one. The 
number lost by the Mexicans was never ascertained, but it was supposed to be more than one 
thousand. 

^ John Ellis Wool is a native of New York. He entered the army in 1812, and soon rose to 
the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, for gallant conduct on Queenstown Heights [page 413]. He was 
breveted brigadier in 182(5, and for gallant conduct at Buena Yista, in 1847, was breveted Major- 
General. He took an active part for his country in the late Civil War, and, in 1862, was 
appointed full Major-General. He died Nov. 10, 1869. 

^ Austin's settlement. See note 5. page 477. ' Pronounced Chee-wah-wah. 

* The agreement for a cessation of hostilities is so called. ' Pronounced Co-ah-weel-ah. 



1849.] POLK'S ADMINISTRATION. 485 

on the coast. That place had already surrendered' [November 14], and being 
informed that Santa Anna was collecting a large force at San Luis Potosi/ he 
returned to Monterey, to reinforce General Worth, if necessary. Worth was 
joined by Wool's division, near Saltillo, on the 20th of December, and Taylor 
again advanced and took possession of Victoria, on the 29th. 

And now the conquering Taylor was compelled to endure a severe trial of 
his temper and patriotism. General Scott^ had arrived 
before Vera Cruz [January, 1847], for the purpose of 
invading Mexico from that point, and being the senior 
officer, took the supreme command. Just as Taylor 
was preparing for a vigorous winter campaign, he re- 
ceived an order from General Scott, to send him a 
large portion of his best officers and troops to assist 
against Vera Cruz, and to act thereafter only on the 
defensive.* Taylor was deeply mortified, but, like a 
true soldier, instantly obeyed, and he and General 
Wool were left with an ao;2;re<iate force of only about 

„ , , . , J^° 111 1 GENERAL SCOTT. 

nve thousand men (only five hundred regulars; to op- 
pose an army of twenty thousand, now gathering at San Luis Potosi, under 
Santa Anna. They united their forces at Agua Nueva,^ twenty miles south 
from Saltillo, on the San Luis road, early in February [Feb. 4, 1847], and 
weak as he was, Taylor determined to fight the Mexicans, who were now ad- 
vancing upon him. The opportunity was not long delayed. The Americans 
fell back [Feb. 21] to Buena Vista, ° within eleven miles of Saltillo, and there, 
in a narrow defile in the mountains, encamped in battle order. At about noon 
the next day [Feb. 22] — the anniversary of the birth of Washington — the Mex- 
ican army approached within two miles of them ; and Santa Anna^ assuring 
Taylor that he was surrounded by twenty thousand troops, and could not 
escape, ordered him to surrender within an hour. Taylor politely refused the 
request, and both armies prepared for battle.' There was some skirmising dur- 




^ Commodore Connor, who commanded the " Home Squadron" in the Gulf, captured Tampico. 
Tobasco and Tuspan were captured by Commodore Perry [page 512], in October following. 

" Santa Anna was elected provisional President of Mexico, in December, and in violation of his 
peace promises to Commodore Connor, he immediately placed himself at the head of the army. 

^ Winfield Scott was born in Virginia in 1786. He was admitted to law practice at the age of 
twenty years. He joined the army in 1808, was made Lieutenant-Colonel in 1812, and passed 
through the war that ensued, witli great honor to himself and his country. He was breveted 
major-general in 1814, and was made general-in-chief of the army in 1841. His successes in Mex- 
ico greatly added to his laurels. On tlie 15th of February, 1855, he was commissioned a Lieu- 
tenant-G-eneral. Owing to infirmities, he retired from active duty in the autumn of 1861. Ho 
died at West Point, May 29, 1866, one of the greatest captains of the age. 

* The necessity for this order was as painful to General Scott as it was mortifying to General 
Taylor. Before leaving Washington, Scott wrote a long private letter to Taylor, apprising him of 
this necessity, expressing his sincere regrets, and speaking in highest praise of the victories already 
achieved in Mexico. ^ Pronounced Ag-wah New-vah, or New Water. 

^ Pronounced Bwe-naw Ves-tah — Pleasant View. This was the name of a hacienda (planta- 
tion) at Angostura. 

' Santa Anna wrote as follows : 

" Camp at Enoatada, February 22d, 1847. 

"God ANT) Liberty'. — ^You are surrounded by twenty thousand men, and can not, in any 
human probability, avoid suffering a rout, and being cut to pieces with your troops ; but as you de- 



486 



THE NATION 



[1845. 



in or the afternoon, when the battle-crj of the Americans was, '■'■The Memory 
of Washington !'^ Early the following morning [Feb. 23] a terrible conflict 
commenced. It was desperate and bloody, and continued until sunset. Sev- 
eral times the overwhelming numbers of the Mexicans appeared about to crush 
the little band of Americans ; and finally Santa Anna made a desperate assault' 
upon the American center, commanded by Taylor in person. It stood like a 
rock before a billow ; and by the assistance of the artillery of Bragg, Wash- 
ino-ton, and Sherman, the martial wave was rolled back, the Mexicans fled in 
confusion, and the Americans were masters of the bloody field. During the 
nio^ht succeeding the conflict, the Mexicans all withdrew, leaving their dead 

and wounded behind them." The invaders 
were now in possession of all the northern 
Mexican provinces, and Scott was prepar- 
ing to storm A''era Cruz' and march to the 
capital.' In the course of a few months 
General Taylor left Wool in command 
[Sept., 1847 J, and returned home, every- 
where receiving tokens of the highest re- 
gard from his countrymen. Let us now 
consider other operations of the war during this period. 

The command of the " Army c'^the West'" was given to General Kearney,* 
with instructions to conquer New Mexico and California. He left Fort Leaven- 
worth in June, and after a journey of nine hundred miles over the Great Plains 
and among the mountain ranges, he arrived at Santa Fe, the capital of New 




RKGION OF TAYLOR 



serve consideration and particular esteem, I wish to save you from such a catastrophe, and for that 
purpose give you this notice, in order that you may surrender at discretion, under the assurance 
that you will be treated with the consideration belonging to the Mexican character; to which end 
you will be granted an hour's time to make up your mind, to commence from the moment that my 
flag of truce arrives in your camp. "With this view, I assure you of my particular consideration. 

" Antoxio Lopez de Santa Anna. 

"To General Z. Taylor, Commanding the Forces of the U. S." 

General Taylor did not take tho allotted time to make up his mind, but instantly sat down and 
wrote the following reply : 

" llEAD-QtTABTEns, Aemy OP OcocTPATioif, Neat Buena Vista, Feb. 22d, 1847. 
"Sir: In reply to your note of this date, summoning mo to surrender my forces at discre- 
tion, I beg leave to say that I decline acceding to your request. With high respect, I am, sir, your 
obedient servant, Z. Taylor, Major-General U. S. Army." 

1 To deceive the Americans, Santa Anna resorted to tho contemptible trick of sending out a, 
flag in token of surrender, at the moment of making the assault, hoping thereby to cause his 
enemy to be less vigilant. Taylor was too weU acquainted with Mexican treachery to be de- 
ceived. 

"^ The Americans lost two hundred and sixty-seven killed, four hundred and fifty-six wounded, 
and twenty-three missing. The Mexicans lost almost two thousand. They left five hundred of 
their comrades dead on the field. Among the Americans slain was Lieutenant-Colonel Clay, son of 
the distinguished Henry Clay, of Kentucky. Page 500. ^ Page 489. 

* On the day of the battle at Buena Vista, General Minon, with eight hundred cavahy, was 
driven from Saltilln bv Captain Webster and a small party of Americans. On the 26th of Februar^v, 
Colonels Morgan and'lrvin defeated a party at Agua Frio; and on the 7th of March, Major^Gid- 
dings was victorious at Ceralvo. Page 483. 

'" Stephen W. Kearney was a native of New Jersey. He was a gallant soldier in the War of 
1812-15. He was breveted a Brigadier in 1846, and Major-Oenoral in December the same year, for 
gallant conduct in the Mexican War. He died at Vera Cruz, in October, 1848, at tlie ag^ of fifty- 
four years. 



1849.] POLK'S ADMINISTRATION. 487 

Mexico, on the 18th of August. He met with no resistance ;' and having taken 
peaceable possession of the country, and constituted Charles Bent its governor, 
he marched toward California. He soon met an express from Commodore Stock- 
ton'' and Lieutenant- Colonel Fremont, informing him that the conquest of Cali- 
fornia had already been achieved. 

Fremont had been sent with a party of about sixty men to explore portions 
of New Mexico and California. When he arrived in the vicinity of Monterey, 
on the Pacific coast, he was opposed by a Mexican force under General Castro. 
Fremont aroused all the American settlers in the vicinity of San Francisco 
Bay, captured a Mexican post and garrison, and nine cannons, and two hun- 
dred and fifty muskets, at Sonoma Pass [June 15, 1846], and then advanced to 
Sonoma, and defeated Castro and his troops. The Mexican authorities were 
eifectually driven out of that region of the country ; and on the 5th of July, 
the American Californians declared themselves independent, and placed Fre- 
mont at the head of their affairs. Two days ::fterw:ird, Commodore Sloat, 
then in command of the squadron in the Paciiie, bombarded and captured Mon- 
terej ; and on the 9th, Commodore Montgomery took i)ossession of San Fran- 
cisco. Commodore Stockton arrived on the 15th, and with Colonel Fremont, 
took possession of the city of Los Angelos on tho 17th of August. On receiv- 
ing this information, Kearney sent the main body of his troops to Santa Fe, 
and with one hundred men he pushed forward to Los Angelos, near the Pacific 
coast, where he met [Dec. 27, 1846] Stockton and Fremont. In company with 
these ofiicers, he shared in the honors of the final important events [Jan. 8, 
1847], which completed the conquest and pacification of California. Fremont, 
the real liberator of that country, claimed the right to be governor, and was 
supported by Stockton and the people ; but Kearney, his superior officer, would 
not acquiesce. Fremont refused to obey him ; and Kearney departed, sailed 
to Monterey, and there, in conjunction with Commodore Shubrick, he assumed 
the office of governor, and proclaimed [Feb. 8, 1847] the annexation of Cali- 
fornia to the United States. Fremont was ordered homo to be tried for dis- 
obedience of orders. He was deprived of his commission ; but the President, 
valuing him as one of the ablest oificcrs in tlio army, offered it to him again. 
Fremont refused it, and went again to tho wilderness and engaged in explor- 
ation. 



' The governor and four thousand Mexicans troojjs fled at his approach, and the people, num- 
bering about sis thousand, quietly submitted. 

^ Robert F. Stockton is a son of one of the Ne^v Jersey signers of the Declaration of Independ- 
ence. He entered the navy in 1811, and was appointed commodore in 1838. He left the navy in 
'Slay, 1850, and was afterwards a member of the United States Senate from New Jersey. ' 

' John Charles Fremont was born at Savannah, Georgia, in January, 1813. His father was a 
Frenchman ; his mother a native of Virginia. He was born while his parents were on a journey, 
and his infancy was spent among the wilds of the south-west. At the age of thirteen he commenced 
the study of law, but was soon afterward placed in a good school for the enlargement of his educa- 
tion. He was very successful ; and after leaving school became a teacher in Charleston, and then 
instructor in mathematics on board a sloop-of-war. As a civil engineer, he had few equals, and in 
this capacity he made many explorations, in the service of private individuals and the government, 
as lieutenant. His several explorations are among the wonders of the age. In 18-16, the citizens 
of Charleston, South Carolina, presented him with an elegant sword, in a gold scabbard, as a testi- 
monial of their appreciation of his great services to the country ; and in 1850, the King of Prussia, 



488 



niE NATION. 



[1845. 



Other stirring events were occurring in the same direction at this time. 
While Kearney was on his way to California, Colonel Doniphan, by his com- 
mand, was engaged, with a thousand Missouri volunteers, in forcing the Nav- 
ajo Indians to make a treaty of peace. This was accomplished on the 22d of 
November, 1846, and then Doniphan marched toward Chihuahua, to join Gen- 
eral Wool, At Braceti, in the valley of the Rio del Norte, they met a large 




Mexican force on the 22d of December, under General Ponce de Leon. He 
sent a black flag to Doniphan, with the message, " We will neither ask nor give 
quarter." The Mexicans then advanced and fired three rounds. The Mis- 
sourians fell upon their faces, and the enemy, supposing them to be all slain, 
rushed forward for plunder. The Americans suddenly arose, and delivering a 
deadly fire from their rifles, killed two hundred JSIexicans^ and dispersed the 
remainder in great confusion. Doniphan then pressed forward, and when 
within eighteen miles of the capital of Chihuahua, he was confronted [Feb. 28, 
1847] by four thousand Mexicans. These he completely routed,' and then 
pressing forward to the city of Chihuahua, he entered it in triumph, raised the 



sent him the grand golden medal struck for those who have made essential progress in science 
In 1851, he was elected t\ie first United States senator for California; and, in June, 1856, he was* 
nominated for tlie office c f President of tlie United States. He served as Major-General in the 
National army during a portion of the late Civil War. He has since been Governor of Arizona. 
' Tlie Americans lost, in kUIed and wounded, only eighteea men ; the Mexicans lost about si'y 
hundred. 



1849.] 



POLK'S ADMINISTEATION. 



489 



flag of the United States upon its citadel, in the midst of a population of forty 
thousand [March 2], and took possession of the province in the name of his gov- 
ernment. After resting six weeks he marched to Saltillo [May 22], where 
General Wool was encamped. From thence he returned to New Orleans, hav- 
ing made a perilous march from the Mississippi, of about five thousand miles. 
The conquest of all Northern Mexico,' with California, was now complete, and 
General Scott was on his march for the great capital. Let us now consider 

GENERAL SCOTT'S INYASION OP MEXICO. 

The Mexican authorities having scorned overtures for peace made bj the 
government of the United States in the autumn of 1846, it was determined to 
conquer the whole country. For that purpose General Scott was directed to 
collect an army, capture Vera Cruz,'' and march to the Mexican capital. His 
rendezvous was at Lobos Island, about one hundi-ed and twenty-five miles north 
from Vera Cruz ; and on the 9th of March, 1847, he landed n%ar the latter with 
an army of about thirteen thousand men, borne thither by a powerful squadron 
commanded by Commodore Connor.^ He invested the city on the 13th ; and 
five days afterward [March 18], having every thing ready for an attack," he 
summoned the town and fortress, for the last time, to surrender A refusal 
was the signal for opening a general cannon- 
ade, and bombardment from his batteries and 
tlie fleet. The siege continued until the 27th, 
when the city, the strong castle of San Juan 
d'Ulloa, with five thousand prisoners, and 
five hundred pieces of artillery, were surren- 
dered to the Americans. The latter had only 
forty men killed, and about the same number 
wounded. At least a thousand Mexicans 
were killed, and a great number were maimed. 
It is estimated that during this siege, not less than six thousand seven hundred 
shots and shells were thrown by the American batteries, weighing, in the ag- 
gregate, more than forty thousand pounds. 

Two days after the siege [March 29, 1847], General Scott took possession 
of Vera Cruz, and on the 8th of April, the advanced force of his army, under 
General Twiggs, commenced their march for the interior by way of Jalapa.^ 
Santa Anna had advanced, with twelve thousand men, to Cerro Gordo, a diffi- 



vHcfpy^r^ SanJuan oe Ulloa 




INTKENCUJIENTS AT \ ERA CliUZ. 



' Some conspiracies in New Mexico against the new government, ripened into revolt, in Janu- 
ary, 1847. Governor Bent and others were murdered at Fernando de Taos on the 19th, and mas- 
sacres occurred in other quarters. On the 23d, Colonel Price, with three hundred and fifty men, 
marched against and defeated the insurgents at Canada, and finally dispersed them at the mountaia 
gorgo called the Pass of Embudo. 

" This city was considered the key to the country. On an island opposite was a very strong 
fortress called the castle of San Juan d'Ulloa [pronounced San-whan-dah-oo-loo-ah], always cele- 
brated for its Qcreat strength, and considered impregnable by the Mexicans. 

' Page 480. 

* The engineering operations were performed very skillfiiUy under the direction of Colonel Tot- 
ten, an officer of the War of 1812. For his bravery at Vera Cruz, he was made Brigadier-General. 
by brevet. He died at Washington City, April 22, 1864. " Pronounced iiah-^iah-pah. 



490 TIIK XATIOX. [1845. 

cult mountain pass at the foot of the eastern chain of the Cordilleras. He was 
strongly fortified, and had many pieces of cannon well placed for defense. 
Scott had followed Twiggs with the main body. He had left a strong garrison 
at Vera Cruz, and his whole army now numbered about eight thousand five 
hundred men. Having skillfully arranged his plans, he attacked the enemy on 
the 18th of April. The assault was successful. More than a thousand Mex- 
icans were killed or wounded, and three thousand were made prisoners. Hav- 
ing neither men to guard, nor food to sustain the prisoners, General Scott dis- 
missed them on parole.' The boastful Santa Anna narrowly escaped capture by- 
fleeing upon a mule taken from his carriage.'^ The Americans lost, in killed 
and wounded, four hundred and thirty-one. 

The victors entered Jalapa on the 19th of April ; and on the 22d, General 
Worth unfurled the stars and stripes upon the castle of Perote, on the summit 
of the eastern Cordilleras, fifty miles from Jalapa. This was considered the 
strongest fortress in Mexico next to Vera Cruz, yet it Avas surrendered without 
resistance. Among the spoils were fifty-four pieces of cannon, and mortars, 
and a large quantity of munitions of war. Onward the victorious army 
marched ; and on the 15th of May [1847] it entered the ancient walled and 
fortified city of Puebla,' without opposition from the eighty thousand inhabit- 
ants within. Here the Americans rested, after a series of victories almost un- 
paralleled. Within two months, an army averaging only about ten thousand 
men, had taken some of the strongest fortresses on this continent, made ten 
thousand prisoners, and captured seven hundred pieces of artillery, ten thou- 
sand stand of arms, and thirty thousand shells and cannon-balls. Yet greater 
conquests awaited them. 

General Scott remained at Puebla until August,* when, being reinforced by 
fresh troops, sent by way of Vera Cruz, he resumed his march toward the cap- 
ital, with more than ten thousand men, 
leaving a large number sick in the hos- 
pital.^ Their route was through a 
beautiful region, well watered, and 
clothed with the richest verdure, and 
then up the slopes of the great Cordil- 
leras. From their lofty summits, and 
almost from the same spot where Cortez and his followers stood amazed mor& 

* Note 6, page 311. 

" Before the battle, Santa Anna said. " I will die fighting rather than the Americans shall 
proudly tread the imperidi city of Azteea." So precipitate was his flight that he left all his papers 
behind him, and his wooden leg. He had been so severely wounded in his leg, while defending 
Yera Cruz against the French, in 1838, that amputation became necessary, and a wooden one was 
substituted. ' Pronounced Pweb-lah. 

* During this long halt of the American army, the government of the United States made un- 
availing efforts to negotiate for peace. The Mexican authorities refiised the olive branch, and 
boasted of their patriotism, valor, and strength, while losing post after post, in their retreat toward 
the capital. 

^ At one time there were eighteen hundred men sick at Puebla ; and at Perote seven hundred 
died during the summer, notwithstanding the situations of these places, on lofty table-lands, wera 
-lonsidered exceedingly healthful. 






^^: 




BOJtBARDMEHT OF VeRA CrOI. 



1849.] 



POLK'S ADMINISTRATION. 



493 



than three centuries before/ Scott and his army looked down [August 10, 1847] 
upon that glorious panorama of intervales, lakes, cities, and villages, in the 
great valley of Mexico — the capital of the Aztec Empire'' — the seat of "the 
Halls of the Montezumas.'" 

General Twiggs* cautiously led the advance of the American army toward 
the city of Mexico, on the 11th of August, and encamped at St. Augustine, on 
the Acapulco road, eight miles south of the capital. Before him lay the strong 
fortress of San (or St.) Antonio, and close on his right were the heights of 
Churubusco, crowned with embattled walls covered with cannons, and to be 
reached in front only by a dangerous causeway. Close by was the fortified 
camp of Contreras, containing six thousand Mexicans, under General Valencia j 
and between it and the city was Santa Anna, and twelve thousand men, held in 
reserve. Such was the general position of the belligerents when, a little after 
midnight on the 20th of August [1847], General Smith^ marched to the attack 
of the camp at Contreras. The battle opened at sunrise. It was sanguinary, 
but brief, and the Americans were victorious. Eighty officers and three thou- 
sand private soldiers were made prisoners ; and the chief trophies were thirty- 
three pieces of artillery. In the mean while, Generals Pierce" and Shields/ 
with a small force, kept Santa Anna's powerful reserve at bay. 

General Scott now directed a similar movement 
against Cherubusco. Santa Anna advanced ; and the 
whole region became a battle-field, under the eye and 
control of the American commander-in-chief. The 
invaders dealt blow after blow successfully. Antonio 
yielded, Churubusco was taken, and Santa Anna aban- 
doned the field and fled to the capital. It was a 
memorable day in Mexico. An army, thirty thou- 
sand strong, had been broken up by another less than 
one third its strength in numbers ; and at almost 
every step the Americans were successful. Full four 
thousand of the Mexicans were killed or wounded, 
three thousand were made prisoners, and thirty seven 
pieces of cannon were taken, all in one day. The 
Americans lost, in killed and wounded, almost eleven operations near mexico. 

* Page 43. 

* According to the faint glimmerings of ancient Mexican history which have come down toua, 
the Aztecs, who occupied that country when it first became known to Europeans [page 43], came 
from the North, and were more refined than any other tribes, which, from time to time, had held 
possession of the country. They built a city within the borders of Lake Tezcuco, and named it 
Mexico, in honor of Mexitli, their god of war. Where the present great cathedral stands, they had 
erected an immense temple, dedicated to the sun, and there offered human sacrifices. It is related, 
that at its consecration, almost sixty thousand human beings were sacrificed. The temple was built 
about the year 1480, by the predecessor of Montezuma, the emperor found by Cortez. 

^ This expression, referring to the remains of the palace of Montezuma in Mexico, was often 
used during the war. 

* David E. Twiggs was born in Georgia, in 1790. He served in the War of 1812, and was 
retained in the army. He was breveted a Major-General after the battle of Monterey, in Mexico. 
He deserted his Sag, and was dismissed from the army in 1861. Died September 15. 1862. 

^ General Persifer F. Smith, of Louisiana. " « Page 5 1 4. 

' General James Shields, of Illinois, afterward a representative of that State m the Senate of 
«he United States. 




494 THE X A T I N. [1845. 

hundred. Thej might now have entered the city of Mexico in triumph, but 
General Scott preferred to bear the olive branch, rather than the palm. As he 
advanced to Tacubaya, [August 21], within three miles of the city, a flag came 
from Santa Anna to ask for an armistice, preparatory to negotiations for peace.' 
It was granted, and Nicholas P. Trist, who had been appointed, by the United 
States government, a commissioner to treat for peace, went into the capital 
[August 24] for the purpose. Scott made the palace of the archbishop, at 
Tacubaya, his head-quarters, and there anxiously awaited the result of the con- 
ference, until the 5th of September, when Mr. Trist returned, with the intelli- 
gence that his propositions were not only spurned with scorn, but that Santa 
Anna had violated the armistice by strengthening the defenses of the city. 
Disgusted with the continual treachery of his foe, Scott declared the armistice 
at an end, on the 7th of September, and prepared to storm the capital. 

The first demonstration against the city was on the morning of the 8th of 
September, when less than four thousand Americans attacked fourteen thousand 
Mexicans, under Santa Anna, at El Molinos del Reij (the King's Mills) near 
Chepultepec. They were at first repulsed, with great slaughter ; but returning 
to the attack, they fought desperately for an hour, and drove the Mexicans from 
their position. Both parties suffered dreadfully. The Mexicans left almost a 
thousand dead on the field, and the Americans lost about eight hundred. And 
now the proud Chepultepec was doomed. It was a lofty hill, strongly fortified, 
and the seat of the military school of Mexico. It was the last place to be 
defended outside the suburbs of the city. Scott erected four heavy batteries to 
bear upon it, on the night of the 11th of September ; and the next day [Sep- 
tember 12, 1847], a heavy cannonade and bombardment commenced. On the 
13th, the assailants commenced a furious charge, routed the enemy, with great 
slaughter, and unifurled the American flag over the shattered castle of Chepul- 
tepec. The Mexicans fled to the city along an aqueduct, pursued by General 
Quitman^ to its very gates. That night, Santa Anna and his army, with the 
ofiicers of government, fled from the doomed capital ; and at four o'clock the 
following morning [September 14], a deputation from the city authorities 
waited upon General Scott, and begged him to spare the town and treat for 
peace. He would make no terms, but ordered Generals Worth and Quitman' 
to move forward, and plant the stripes and stars upon the National Palace. 
Ttie victorious generals entered at ten o'clock, and on the Grand Plaza^* took 
formal possession of the Mexican Empire. Order soon reigned in the capital. 
Santa Anna made some feeble efforts to regain lost power, and failed. He 
appeared before Puebla on the 22d of September, where Colonel Childs had 
been besieged since the 13th. The approach of General Lane frightened him 
away ; and in a battle with the troops of that leader at Huamantla, Santa 

^ Note 1, page 242. 

^ John A. Quitman was a native of New York. He led volunteers to the Mexican war, and 
was presented with a sword by Congress. He was Governor of Mississippi in 1851, and was a 
ieader of secessionists. He died July 15, 1858. 

^ The approach of each was along separate aqueducts. See map, page 493. 

* Place. This is the large public square in the city of Mexico. 




General Scott Exterino the City of Mexico 



1S49.] POLK'S ADMINISTRATION. « 497 

Anna was defeated. On the 18th of October he was again defeated at Atlixco, 
and there his troops deserted him. Before the close of October, he was a 
fugitive, stripped of every commission, and seeking safety, by flight, to the 
shores of the Gulf ' The president of the Mexican Congress assumed provis- 
ional authority : and on the 2d of February, 1848, that body concluded a treaty 
of peace, with commissioners of the United States at Gaudaloupe Hidalgo. 
This treaty was finally agreed to by both governments, and on the 4th of July 
following, President Polk proclaimed it. It stipulated the evacuation of Mex- 
ico by the American army, within three months ; the payment of three millions 
of dollars in hand, and twelve miUions of dollars, in four annual instalments, 
by the United States to Mexico, for the territory acquired by conquest ; and in 
addition, to assume debts due certain citizens of the United States to the 
amount of three millions five hundred thousand dollars. It also fixed bound- 
aries, and otherwise adjusted matters in dispute. New Mexico and California 
now became Territories of the United States. 

During the same month that a treaty of peace was signed at Gaudaloupe 
Hidalgo, a man employed by Captain Sutter, who owned a mill twenty-five 
miles up the American fork of the Sacramento River, discovered gold. It was 
very soon found in other localities, and during the summer, rumors of the fact 
reached the United States. These rumors assumed tangible form in President 
Polk's message in December, 1848 ; and at the beginning of 1849, thousands 
were on their way to the land of gold. Around Cape Horn, across the Isthmus 
of Panama, and over the great central plains of the continent, men went by 
hundreds ; and far and wide in California, the precious metal was found. From 
Europe and South America, hundreds flocked thither ; and the Chinese came 
also from Asia, to dig gold. The dreams of the early Spanish voyagers," and 
those of the English who sought gold on the coasts of Labrador,^ and up the 
rivers in the middle of the continent,^ have been more than realized. Emigrants 
continued to go thither so late as 1875, and the gold sesms inexhaustible." 

The war with Mexico, and the settlement of the Oregon boundary question" 
with Great Britain, were the most prominent events, having a relation to for- 
eign powers, which distinguished Mr. Polk's administration. Two measures of 
a domestic character, appear prominently among many others which mark his 
administration as full of activity. These were the establishment of an inde- 
pendent treasury system,' by which the national revenues are collected in gold 
and silver, or treasury notes, without the aid of banks ; and a revision of the 
tariff laws in 1846, by which protection to American manufacturers was 
lessened. It was during the last year of his admmistration that Wisconsin wa» 
admitted [May 29, 1848] into the Union of States, making the whole number 
thirty. At about this time, the people of the Union were preparing for another 
presidential election. The popularity which General Taylor had gained by his 
brilliant victories in Mexico, caused him to be nominated for that exalted sta- 
tion, in many parts of the Union, even before he returned home ;' and he was 

' Note 6, page 515. * Page 43. « Page 52. * Page 56. * Note 3, page 373. 

" Page 479. ^ Note 2, page 471. • Page 486. 

32 



498 



THE NATION. 



[1849. 



chosen to be a candidate for that office, by a national convention held at Phila- 
delphia in June, 1848. His opponent was General Lewis Cass, of Michigan, 
now [1856] United States senator from that State.' General Taylor was 
elected bj a large majority, with Millard Fillmore, of New York, as Vice- 
President. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

TAYLOR'S ADMINISTRATION [1849 — 1850.] 

The 4th of March, 1849, was Sunday, and the inauguration of Zachary 
Taylor,* the twelfth President of the United States, did not take place until the 




next day. Again people had gathered at the Federal city from all parts of 
the Union, and the day being pleasant, though cloudy, a vast concourse were 

* Note 2, page 424. 

" Zachary Taylor was born in Virginia, in November, 1784. He went with his father to Ken- 
tucky the following year, and his childhood was passed near the present city of Louisville. He 
entered the United States army in 1807. He was a distinguished subaltern during '.he war of 
1812-15, and attained the rank of major. He was of great service in the Florida War [page 468] ; 
and when hostilities with Mexico appeared probable, he was sent in that direction, and, as we 
have seen, displayed great skill and bravery. He died in July, 1860, having performed the duties 
of President for only sixteen months. 



1850.] TAYLOR'S ADMINISTRATION. 499 

assembled in front of the eastern portico of the capitol, long before the appointed 
hour for the interesting ceremonies. In a clear and distinct voice, he pro- 
nounced his inaugural address, and then took the oath of oifice administered by 
Chief Justice Taney. On the following day he nommated his cabinet officers/ \ 
and the appointments were immediately confirmed by the Senate. With the 
heart of a true patriot and honest man, Taylor entered upon his responsible 
duties with a sincere desire to serve his country as faithfully in the cabinet, as 
he had done in the field." He had the sympathies of a large majority of the 
people with him, and his inauguration was the promise of great happiness and 
prosperity for the country. 

When President Taylor entered upon the duties of his office, thousands of 
adventurers were flocking to California from all parts of the Union, and ele- 
ments of a new and powerful State were rapidly gathering there. Statesmen 
and politicians perceived the importance of the new Territory, and soon the 
question whether slavery should have a legal existence there, became an absorb- 
ing topic in Congress and among the people. The inhabitants of California 
decided the question for themselves. In August, 1849, General Riley, the 
military Governor of the Territory, established a sort of judiciary by proclama- 
tion, with Peter H. Burnet as Chief Justice. Before that time there was no 
statute law in California. By proclamation, also, Governor Riley summoned 
a convention of delegates to meet at Monterey, to form a State Constitution. 
Before it convened, the inhabitants in convention at San Francisco, voted 
against slavery ; and the Constitution, prepared and adopted at Monterey, on 
the first of September, 1849, excluded slavery from the Territory, forever. 
Thus came into political form the crude elements of a State, the birth and 
maturity of which seems like a dream. All had been accomplished within 
twenty months from the time when gold was discovered near Sutter's Mill. 

Under the Constitution, Edward Gilbert and G. H. Wright, were elected 
delegates for California in the National House of Representatives ; and the State 
liegislature, at its first session, elected John Charles Fremont' and William M. 
Gwinn, United States senators. When the latter went to Washington, they 
carried their Constitution with them, and presented a petition [February, 
1850] asking for the admission of that Territory into the Union as a free and 
independent State." The article of the Constitution which excludcl slavery, 
became a cause for violent debates in Congress, and of bitter sectional feeling 
in the South against the people of the North. The Union, so strong in 
the hearts of the people, was shaken to its center, and prophets of evil 

' He appointed John M. Clayton, Secretary of State ; William M. Meredith, Secretary of the 
Treasury; George W. Crawford, Secretary of War ; William B. Preston, Secretary of the Navyf 
Thomas Ewing, Secretary of the Interior (a new ofSce recently established, in which Pome of the 
duties before performed by the State and Treasury departments are attended to) ; Jacob Collamer, 
Postmaster-General ; and Reverdy Johnson, Attorney-General 

" Page 481 to page 486, inclusive. ' Page 488. 

* At this time our government was perplexed by the claims of Texas to portions of the Terri- 
tory of New Mexico, recently acquired [page 497], and serious difficulty was apprehended. Early 
in 1850, the inhabitants of New Mexico petitioned Congress for a civil government, and the Mor- 
mons of the Utah region also petitioned for the organization of the country they had recently 
flettled, into a Territory of the United States. 



500 



THE NATT&N. 



[1849. 



predicted its speedy dissolution. As in 1832/ there were menaces of secession 
from the Union, by Southern representatives, and never before did civil war 
appear so inevitable. Happily for the country, some of the ablest statesmen 
and patriots the Republic had ever gloried in. were members of the national 
Legislature, at that time, and with consummate skill they directed and con- 
trolled the storm. In the midst of the tumult and alarm in Congress, and 
throughout the land. Henry Clay again'' appeared as the potent peace-maker 




^r^^ 



between the Hotspurs of the North and South ; and on the 25th of January, 
1850, he oflfered, in the Senate a plan of compromise which met the difficulty. 
Eleven days afterward [February 5, 1850] he spoke nobly in defense of his 
plan, denounced secession as treason, and implored his countrymen to make 



* Page 381. 

' Page 464. Henry Clay was born in Hanover county, Virginia, in April, 1777. His early edu- 
cation was defective, and he arose to greatness by tlie force of his own genius. His extraordinary 
intellectual powers began to develop at an early age, and at nineteen he commenced the study 
of the law. When admitted to practice, at the age of twenty, he went over the mountains to the 
fertile valleys of Kentucky, and there laid the foundations of his greatness as a lawyer and orator. 
The latter quality was first fully developed when a convention was called to revise the Constitution 
of Kentucky. Then he worked manfullj'' and unceasingly to procure the election of delegates who 
would favor the emancipation of the slaves. He became a member of the Kentucky Legislature in 
1803, and there he took a front rank. He was chosen to fill a vacant seat in the United States 
Senate in 1806, and in 1811 he was elected a member of the House of Representatives, and became 
its Speaker. From that time until his death, he was continually in public life. He long held a 
front rank among American statesmen, and died, while a member of the United States Senate, ia 
the city ofWashington, at the close of June, 1852. 



1850.] FILLMORE'S ADMINISTRATION. 501 

€verj sacrifice but honor, in support of the Union. Mr. Clay's plan was 
warmly seconded by Daniel Webster;' and other senators approving of compro- 
mise, submitted propositions. Finally, on motion of Senator Foote of Missis- 
sippi, a committee of thirteen was appointed to consider the various plans and 
report a bill. The committee consisted of six northern and six southern sen- 
ators, and these chose the thirteenth. The Senate appointed Mr. Clay chairman 
of the committee, and on the 8th of May following, he reported a bill. It was 
discussed for four months, and on the 9th of September, each measure included 
in the bill having been thoroughly considered separately, the famous Compro- 
mise Act of 1850, having passed both Houses of Congress, became a law. 
Because several measures, distinct in their objects, were embodied in the act, it 
is sometimes known as the " Omnibus Bill." The most important stipulations 
of the act were, 1st. That California should be admitted into the Union as a 
State, with its anti-slavery Constitution, and its territorial extent from Oregon 
to the Mexican possessions ; 2d. That the vast country east of California, con- 
taining the Mormon settlements near the Great Salt Lake,' should be erected 
into a Territory called Utah, without mention of slavery ; od. That New Mex- 
ico should be erected into a Territory, within satisfactory boundaries, and with- 
out any stipulations respecting slavery, and that ten millions of dollars should 
be paid to Texas from the National treasury, in purchase of her claims ; 4th. 
That the slave-trade in the District of Columbia should be abolished ; 6th. A 
law providing for the arrest in the northern or free States, and return to their 
masters, of all slaves who should escape from bondage. The last measure of 
tlie Compromise Act produced wide-s|)read dissatisfaction in the Free-labor 
States ; and the execution, evasion, and violation of the law, in several 
instances, have led to serious disturbances and much bitter sectional feeling. 

While the great Compromise question was under discussion, the nation was 
called to lament the loss of its Chief Magistrate. President Taylor was seized 
with a malady, similar in its effects to cholera, which terminated his earthly 
career on the 9th of July, 1850. In accordance with the provisions of the 
Constitution/ he was immediately succeeded in office by 

MILLARD FILLMORE,* 

who, on the 10th of July, took the oath to " preserve, protect, and defend the 
Constitution of the United States." President Taylor's cabinet resigned; but 
the new President, with great delicacy, declined to consider their resignations 

' Page 503. ^ Page 503. ^ Article II., sectiou 1, of the National Constitution. 

'' Millard FiUmore was born in January, 1800, in Cayuga county, New York. His early edu- 
cation was limited, and at a suitable age he was apprenticed' to a wool-carder. At the age of nine- 
teen, his talent attracted the attention of Judge Wood, of Cayuga county, and he took the humble 
apprentice under his charge, to study the science of law. He became eminent in his profession. 
He was elected to the Assembly of his native State in 1829, and in 1832, was chosen to represent 
his district in Congress. He was re-elected in 1837, and was continued in office «everal years. In 
1844, he was an unsuccessful candidate for the office of Governor of his native State, and in 1848 
he was elected Vice-President of the United States. The death of Taylor gave him the presidency, 
and he conducted public affairs with dignity and skill. In the summer of 1856, he was nominated - 
for the ofiBce of President of the United States, by the "American" party, with A. J. Donelson fcr 
Vice-President. See Note 1, page 479. He died March 8, 1874. 



502 



T H !■: X A T I N. 



[1850. 



until after the obsequies of the deceased President had been performed. At hia 
request, thej remained in office until the 15th of the month, when President 
Fillmore appointed new heads of the departments.' 

The administration of President Taylor had been brief, but it was distin- 




c.yUZ/Liu^Z^ c/U^^^-^t-^-uO 



guished by events intimately connected, as we shall observe, by men and' 
measui-es, with the late Civil War. One of these was an invasion of Cuba by a 
force under General Lopez, a native of that island, wliich was organized and. 
officered in the United States, in violation of existing neutrality laws. It was 
said that the native Cubans were restive under the rule of Spanish Governor- 
Generals,^ and that a desire for independence burned in the hearts of many of 
the best men there. Lopez was ranked among these, and, in forming this 
invading expedition, he counted largely upon tliis fteling for co-operation. He 

Daniel Webster, Secretary of State; Thomas Gorwin, Secretary of the Treasury; Charles M. 
Conrad, Secretary of War; Alexander H. H.Stuart, Secretary of the Interior; William A. Graham, 
Secretary of the 'Navy ; John J. Crittenden, Attorney-General ; Nathan K. Hall, Postmaster-Gen- 
eral. Daniel Webster was born in Salisbury, New Hampshire, in January, 1782, and was educated, 
chiefly at the Phillips Academy at Exter, and Dartmouth College at Hanover. He studied law 
in Boston, and was admitted to the bar in 1805. He commenced practice in his native State, and 
soon became eminent. He first appeared in public life in 1813, when he took his seat as a member 
of the National Htuse of Representatives. At that session his speeches were remarkable, and a 
southern member remarked, " The North has not his equal, nor the South his superior." Although 
in public life a greater portion of the time from that period until his death, yet he always had an 
extensive and lucrative law practice. He stood foremost as a constitutional lawyer; and for many 
years he was peerless as a statesman. He died at Marshfield, Massachusetts, in October, 1852, at. 
the age of almost seventy-one years. ^&gQ 40. 



1853.] 



FILLMORE'S ADMINISTRATION". 



503 



landed at Cardenas on the 19th of April, 1850, expecting to be joined by some 
of the Spanish troops and native Cubans, and by concerted action to overturn 
the Government. But the people and troops did not co-operate with him, and 
he returned to the United States to prepare for a more formidable expedition. 
We shall meet him again presently. 




S^Or^ ;#^z^ 



During Taylor's administration, one State was formed and three Territories 
were organized ; .aid preparations were made for establishing other local 
governments wit'.iin the domain of the United States. That State was 
California, and ihe Territories were of those of New Mexico, Utah, and Minne- 
sota.' The greater portion of the inhabitants of Utali are of the religious sect 
called Mormons, who, after suffering much in Missouri and Illinois, from their 
opposers, left those States in 1848, and penetrated the deep wilderness in the 
interior of our continent ; and near the Great Salt Lake, in the midst of the 
savage Utah tribes, they have built a large city, made extensive plantations, 
and founded an empiie almost as large, in territorial extent, as that of 



Minnesota (sky-colored water) is the Indian name of the river St. Peter, the largest tributary 
of the Mississippi, in that region. It was a part of the vast Territory of Louisiana, and was organ- 
ized in March, 1849. An embryo village, twelve miles below the Falls of St. Anthony named 
St. Paul, was made the capital, and in less than ten years it contained more than ten thousand 
souls. Its growth was unprecedented, even in the wonderful progress of other cities of the West 
and at one time it promised to speedily equal Chicago iu its population. The whole reo-ion of 
Mmnesota is very attractive ; and it has been called the New England of the West ° 




504 THE NATION. [1850. 

Alexander the Great.' The sect was founded in 1827, by a slirewd young 
man named Joseph Smith, a native of central New York, who professed to 
have received a special revelation from Heaven, giving 
him knowledge of a book which had been buried many 
centuries before, in a hill near the village of Palmyra, 
whose leaves were of gold, upon which were engraved 
the records of the ancient people of America, and a 
new gospel for man. He found dupes, believers, and 
followers ; and now [1883] there are Mormon mission- 
aries in many jiortions of the globe, and the communion 
numbers, probably, not less than two hundred and fifty 
JOSEPH SMITH. thousand souls. There has long been a sufficient number 

in Utah to entitle them to a State constitution, and admission into the Union, 
but their social system, Avhich embraces polygamy, sanctioned by authority, is 
a bar to such admission. Their permission of polygamy, or men having more 
than one wife, will be a serious bar to their admission, for Chiistianity and 
sound morality forbid the custom. The Mormons have poetically called their 
country Deseret — the land of the Honey Bee — but Congress has entitled it 
Utah, and by that name it must be known in history. 

The country inhabited by the IVIormons is one of the most remarkable on the 
face of the globe. It consists of a series of extensive valleys and rocky mar- 
gins, spread out into an immense basin, surrounded by rugged mountains, out 
of which no waters flow. It is midway between the States on the Mississippi 
and the Pacific Ocean, perfectly isolated from habitable regions, and embracing 
a domain covering sixteen degrees of longitude in the Utah latitude. On the 
east are the sterile spurs of the Rocky Mountains, stretching down to the vast 
plains traversed by the Platte river ; on the west, extending nearly a thousand 
miles toward the Pacific, are arid salt deserts, broken by barren mountains; 
and north and south are immense mountain districts. The valleys afford pe- 

' The Mormon exodus was one of the most wonderful events on record, when considered in all 
its phases. In September, 1846, the last Hngering Mormons at Nauvoo, Illinois, where they had 
built a splendid temple, were driven away at the point of the bayonet, by 1,600 troops. In Febru- 
ary preceding, some sixteen hundred men, women, and children, fearful of the wrath of the people 
around them, had crossed the Mississippi on the ice, and traveling with ox-teams and on foot, they 
penetrated the wilderness to the Indian country, near Council Bluffs, on the Missouri. The rem- 
nant who started in autumn, many of whom M-ere sick men, feeble women, and dehcate girls, were 
compelled to traverse the same dreary region. The united host, under the guidance of Brigbam 
Young, who is yet their temporal and spiritual leader, halted on the broad prairies of ilissouri the 
following summer, turned up the virgin soil, and planted. Here leaving a few to cultivate and 
gather for wanderers who might come after them, the host moved on, making the wilderness vocal 
with preaching and singing. " Order marked every step of their progress, for the voice of Young, 
whom they regarded as a seer, was to tliem as the voice of God. Ou they went, forming Tabernacle 
Camps, or" temporary resting-places in the wilderness. No obstacles impeded their progress. They 
forded swift-running streams, and bridged the deeper floods ; crept up the great eastern slopes of the 
Rocky Mountains, and from the lofty summits of the Wasatch range, they beheld, on the 20th of 
July, 1847, the valley where they were to rest and build a city, and the placid waters of the Great 
Salt Lake, glittering in the beams of the setting sun. To those weary wanderers, this moutain top 
was a Pisgah. From it they saw the Promised Land — to them a scene of wondrous interest. 
"Westward, lofty peaks, bathed in purple air, pierced the sky ; and as far as the eye could reach, 
north and south, stretched the fertile Valley of Promise, and here and there the vapors of hot 
springs, gushing from rocky coverts, curled above the hills, Uke smoke from the hearth-fires of home. 
The Pilgrims entered the valley on the 21st of July, and on the 24th the President and High 
Council arrived. There they planted a city, the Jerusalem — the Holy City — of the Mormon people. 




MoEMON Emigration. 



1851.] FILLMORE'S ADMINISTRATION. 507 

rennial pasturage, and the soil is exceedingly fertile. Wild game abounds in 
the mountains ; the streams ai*e filled with excellent fish ; the climate is 
delightful at all seasons of the year; and "breathing is a real luxury." 
South-ward, over the rim of the great basin, is a fine cotton-growing region, 
into which the Mormons are penetrating. The vast hills and mountain slopes 
present the finest pasturage in the world for sheep, alpacas, and goats. The 
water-power of the whole region is immense. Iron-mines everywhere abound, 
and in the Green river basin, there are inexhaustible beds of coal. In these 
great natural resources and defenses, possessed by a people of such indomitable 
energy and perseverance as the Mormons have shown, we see the vital ele- 
ments of a powerful mountain nation, in proportions, in the heart of our conti- 
nent, and in the direct patliAvay from the Atlantic to the Pacific States, that 
may yet pl^^y a most important part, for good or for evil, in the destinies of 
our country and of the world. 

The most important measure adopted during the early part of Fillmore's 
administration was tlie Compromise Act, already considered.' During his ofti- 
cial career the President firmly supported the measure, and at the close of his 
administration, in the spring of 1853, there seemed to be very little disquie- 
tude in the public mind on the subject of slavery. That calm was the lull 
before a tempest. The Fugitive Slave Law was so much at variance with the 
spirit of free institutions. Christian ethics, and the civilization of the age, that 
the hearts of the people of the free-labor States, and of thousands in the slave- 
labor States, burned with a desire not only to purge the National statute-books 
of that law, but to stay the further spread of slavery over the domain of the 
Republic. That desire, and a determination of the slave-holders to «xtend the 
area of their labor system, speedily led to teiTible results, as we shall observe 
presently. 

In the spring of 1851, Congress made important and salutary changes in 
the general post-ofiice laws, chiefiy in the reduction of letter postage, fixing 
the rate upon a letter weighing not more than half an ounce, and pre-paid, at 
three cents, to any part of the United States, excepting California and the 
Pacific Territories. The exception was afterward 
abandoned. At the same time, electro-magnetic tele- 
graphing had become quite perfect ; and by means of 
the subtile agency of electricity, communications were 
speeding over thousands of miles of iron wire, Avith 
the rapidity of lightning. The establishment of this 
instantaneous communication between distant points 
is one of the most important achievements of this age 
of invention and discovery ; and the names of Fulton 
and Morse^ will be forever indissolubly connected in 
the commercial and social history of our republic. 
During the summer of 1851, there was again con- 

' Page 501. 

"^ In 1832, Professor Samuel F. B. Morso had his attention directed to the experiments of 
Franklin, upon a wire a few miles in lengtli on tlie banks of tlie Scliuylkill, in which the velocity 




508 TS^ NATION. [1851. 

giderable excitement produced throughout the country because other concerted 
movements were made, at different points, in the organization of a military 
force for the purpose of invading Cuba.' The vigilance of the government of 
the United States was awakened, and orders were given to its marshals to 
arrest suspected men, and seize suspected vessels and munitions of war. Pur- 
suant to these orders, the steamboat Cleopatra was detained at New York ; 
and several gentlemen, of the highest respectability, were arrested on a charge 
of a violation of existing neutrality laws. In the mean time the greatest 
excitement prevailed in Cuba, and forty thousand Spanish troops were concen- 
trated there, while a considerable naval force watched and guarded the coasts. 
These hindrances caused the dispersion of the armed bands who were pre- 
paring to invade Cuba, and quiet was restored for a while. But in July the 
excitement was renewed. General Lopez,* who appears to have been under the 
control of designing politicians, made a speech to a large crowd in New 
Orleans, in favor of an invading expedition. Soon afterward [August, 1851], 
he sailed from that port with about four hundred and eighty followers, and 
landed [August 11] on the northern coast of Cuba. There he left Colonel 
' William L. Crittenden, of Kentucky, with one hundred men, and proceeded 
toward the interior. Crittenden and his party were captured, carried to 
Havana, and on the 16th were shot. Lopez was attacked on the 13th, and his 
little army was dispersed. He had been deceived. There appeared no signs 
of a promised revolution in Cuba, and he became a fugitive. He was arrested 
on the 28th, with six of his followers, taken to Havana, and on the 1st of 
September was executed. 

In the autumn of 1851, more accessions were made to the vastly extended 

•of electricity was found to be so inappreciable that it was supposed to be instantaneous. Pro- 
fessor Morse, pondering upon this subject, suggested that electricity might be made the means of 
recording characters as signs of intelligence at a distance: and in the autumn of 1832 he con- 
structed a portion of the instrumentalities for that purpose. In 1835 he showed the first com- 
plete instrument for telegraphic recording, at the New York City University. In 1837 he 
completed a more perfect machinery. In 1838 he submitted the matter and the telegraphic 
instruments to Congress, asking their aid to construct a line of sufficient length "to test its 
practicability and utility." The committee to whom the subject was referred reported favorably, 
and proposed an appropriation of .$30,000 to construct the first line. The appropriation, how- 
ever, was not made until the 3d of March, 1843. The posts for supporting the wires were 
erected between "Washington and Baltimore, a distance of forty miles. In the spring of 1844 
the line was completed, and the proceedings of the Democratic Convention, then sitting in Balti- 
more, which nominated James K. Polk for the Presidency of the United States, was the first use, 
for public purposes., ever made by the telegraph, whose lines have been extended to all parts of 
the civilized world, the total length of which, at this time [1883], is more than 250,000 miles. 
Professor Morse's system of Recording Telegraphs is adopted generally on the continent of 
Europe, and has been selected by the "government of Australia for the telegraphic systems of 
tluxt country. Avery ingenious machine for recording telegraphic communications with print- 
ing types, so as to avoid the necessity of copying, was constructed, a few years ago, by House, 
and is now extensively used. Professor Morse was the eldest son of Rev. Jedediah Morse, the 
firsi American geographer. Pie was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts, in 1791, and was 
graduated at Yale College in 1810. He studied painting in England, and was very success- 
ful. He was one of the founders of the National Academy of besign in New York, and he 
was tlic first to (lrli\(r a ((.urse of lectures upon art in America. He became a professor in 
the Univeisity (.f ilir (•ii\ of New York, and there perfected his magnetic telegraph. Mr. 
Morse resided on his l)(auiilid estate of Locust Grove, near Poughkeepsie, New York, butsince 
the summer of IHGG had spent much time in Europe. He received many testimonials of appre- 
ciiition from eminent individuals and societies beyond the Atlantic. He died April 2, 1872. 
' Page 502. ' Page 502. 



1851.] PILLMORE'S AD il INIST R AT 10 N. 5Q9 

possessions of the United States. Population was pouring into the regions of 
the Northwest, beyond the Mississippi, and crowding the dusky inhabitants of 
the Indian reservations in Minnesota. Negotiations for a cession of those 
lands to the United States were opened. These resulted in the purchase of 
many millions of acres from the Upper and Lower Sioux tribes of Indians,' 
their i-emoval to another reservation, and the blooming of the wilderness they 
occupied under the hands of the white man. And while inter-emigration was 
seen flowing in a continuous stream in that direction, population was also 
flowing in large volume from Europe, increasing the inhabitants and wealth 
of the country. There had been for some time unwonted activity everywhere, 
and this was one of its many phases. States and Territories were growing. 
Additional representatives in the National Legislature were crowding its halls.' 
These were becoming too narrow, and Congress made provision for enlarging 
them. Accordingly, on the 4th of July, 1851, the corner-stone of the addition 
to the National Capitol was laid by the President, with appropriate cere- 
monies.^ 

Circumstances at about the time Ave are considering, caused a remarkable 
American expedition to the polar regions. Sir John Franklin, an English 
navigator, sailed to that part of the globe, with two vessels, in May, 1845, in 
search of the long-sought northwest passage from Europe to the West Indies.* 
Years passed by, and no tidings of him came. Expe- 
ditions were sent from England in search of him; 
and in May, 1850, Henry Grinnell, a wealthy mer- 
chant of New- York, sent two ships, in charge of Lieu- 
tenant De Haven, to assist in the benevolent eflbrt. 
They returned, after remarkable adventures, in the 
autumn of 1851, without success. The eflbrt was 
renewed by the opulent merchant, in connection with 
his government, in 1853, and in May of that year 
two vessels under the command of Elisha Kent Kane, 
M. D., the surgeon of the first expedition, sailed from 
New York, while a similar expedition was sent out 

from England. Kane and his party made valuable discoveries, among which 
was that of the " open polar sea," whose existence was believed in by scien- 

' Page 31. 

" Each State is entitled to two senators. The number of States now [1867] being thirty- 
eight, the Senate is composed of seventy-six members. The number of Representatives to which 
each State is entitled, is determined by the number of inhabitants and the ratio of representation. 
The present number of the members in the House of Representatives is two hundred and fifty- 
three, including delegates from nine Territories. 

* Note 1, page 388. On the occasion of laying the corner-stone, an oration was pronounced 
by Daniel Webster, in the course of wliich he said: "If, tlierefore, it sliall hereafter be the wQl 
of God that this structure shall fall from its base, that its foundations be upturned, and the 
deposit beneath this stone brouglit to the eyes of men, be it tlien known, tliat on this daj' the 
Union of the United States of America stands firm — that their Constitution still exists unimpaired, 
and with all its usefulness and glory, growing every day stronger in the aSections of the great 
body of tlie American people, and attracting, more and more, the admiration of the world." 

* Note 2, page 47, also page 52, and note 8, page 59. 

* Elisha Kent Kane was born in PhOadelphia, in February, 1822, and he took his degree in 
the Medical University of Pennsylvania in 1 843. He entered the American narj as assistant- 




510 ^HE NATION" [18:i. 

tific men, but they failed to find Sir John Franklin.' They suffered much, 
and were finally compelled to abandon their ships and make their way iu 
open boats to a Danish settlement in Greenland. Their long absence created 
fears for their safety, and a relief expedition was sent in search of them. In 
the vessels of the latter they returned home in the autumn of 1855.' 

The public attention was directed to, and popular sympathy was strongly 
excited in behalf of Hungary, by the arrival in the United States, toward the 
close of 1851, of Louis Kossuth, the exiled Governor of that country, whose 
people, during the revolutions of 1848,^ had sought independence of the crown 
of Austria. He came to ask material aid for his country in its struggle which 
then continued. The sympathy of the people with the Hungarians, and the 
eloquence of the exile, as he went from place to place pleading the cause of his 
nation and enunciating important international doctrines,'* made his mission 
the chief topic of thought and conversation for a long time. The policy of our 
government forbade its giving material aid, but Kossuth received the expres- 
sion of its warmest sympathies.* His advent among us, and his bold enuncia* 

surgeon, and was attached as a physician to the first American embassy to China. While in the 
East, he visited many of the Islands, and met with wild adventures. After that he ascended the 
Nile to the confines of Nubia, and passed a season in Egypt. After traveling through Greece 
and a part of Europe, on foot, he returned to the United States in 1846. He was immediately sent 
to the coast of Africa, where he narrowly escaped death from fever. Soon after his recovery he 
weiit to Mexico, as a volunteer in the war then progressing, where his bravery and endurance 
commanded universal admiration. His horse w-as killed under him, and himself was badly 
wounded. He was appointed senior surgeon and naturalist to the " Grinuel Expedition," men- 
tioned in the text: and after liis return he prepared an interesting account of the exploration. 
He was appointed to the command of a second expedition, and he accomplished much in behalf 
of geographical science. Dr. Kane held an accomplished pencil and ready pen, and his scientific 
attainments were of a high order. The records of this wonderful expedition, prepared by himself, 
were published in two superb volumes, illustrated by engravings from drawings by his hand. The 
hardships which he had endured made great inroads on the health of Dr. Kane (who was a very 
light man, weighing only 106 pounds); and in October, 1856, he sailed for England, and from 
thence to Havana, where he died on the 16th of February, 1857. 

' In 1855, an overland exploring party, sent by the Hudson's Bay Fur Compan}^, were 
informed by the Esquimaux that about four years before a party of white men had perished in 
the region of Montreal Island. They saw among the Indians articles known to have belonged to 
Sir John and his party, and the belief is that they perished on the northern borders of North 
America, so late as the year 1851. 

^ In the mean time the great problem, which for three hundred years had perplexed the mari- 
time world, had been worked out by an English navigator. The foct of a northwest passage 
around the Arctic coast of North America, from Baffin's Bay to Behring's Straits, has been 
unquestionabl_y demonstrated by Captain McClure, of the ship Investigator, who was sent in search 
of Sir John Franklin in October, 1853. Having passed through Behring's Straits, and sailed 
eastward, he reached a point, with sleds upon the ice, which had been penetrated by navigators 
from the East (Captain Parry and others), thus establishing the fact that there is a water connec- 
tion between Baftin's Bay and those straits. Already the mute whale had demonstrated this fact 
to tjie satisfaction of naturalists. The same species are found in Behring's Straits and Baffin's 
Bay, and as the waters of the tropical regions would be like a sea of fire to them, they must have 
had communication through the polar channels. Subsequently traces of the lost explorers 
were discovered. 

" In February, 1848. the French people drove Louis Philippe from his throne, and formed a 
temporary republic. The revolutionary spirit spread; and within a few months, almost every 
countr}' on the continent of Europe was in a state of agitation, and the mouarchs made many 
concessions to the people, Hungary made an effort to become free from the rule of Austria, but 
was crushed by the power of a Russian army. 

•* He asserted that grand principle, thai one nation has no right to interfere with the domestic 
concerns of another, and that all nations are bound to use their e8"orts to prevent such interference. 

* Matters connected with his reception, visit, artd desires occupied much of the attention of 
Congress, and elicited warm debates during the session of 1 852. The Chevalier Hulseman, the 
Austrian minister at Washington, formally protested ttgainst the reception of Kossuth by Cou- 



1852.] FILLMORE'S ADMINISTRATION. 511 

tion of the hitherto unrecognized national duties, are important and interestino- 
events in the history of our republic. 

Some ill-feeling between Great Britain and the United States was engen- 
dered during the summer of 1852, when the subject of difficulties concernino- 
the fisheries' on the coast of British America was brought to the notice of Con- 
gress, and for several months there were indications of a seriou* disturbance 
of the amicable relations between the two governments. American fishers 
were chdrged with a violation of the treaty of 1818, which stipulated that they 
should not cast their lines or nets in the bays of the British possessions, except 
at a distance of three miles or more from the shore. Now, the British o-overn- 
ment claimed the right to draw a line from head-land to head-land of these 
bays, and to exclude the Americans from the waters within that line." An 
armed naval force was sent to sustain this claim, and American vessels were 
threatened with seizure if they did not comply. The government of the United 
States regarded the assumption as illegal, and two steam-vessels of war 
{Princeton and Fulton) were sent to the coast of Nova Scotia to protect the 
rights of American fishermen. The dispute was amicably settled by mutual 
concessions, in October, 1853, and the cloud passed by. 

During the summer of 1853, another measure of national concern was ma- 
tured and put in operation. The great importance of commercial intercourse 
with Japan, because of the intimate relations which must soon exist between 
our Pacific coast and the East Indies, had been felt ever since the foundation 
of Oregon^ and California.* An expedition, to consist of seven ships of war, 
under the command of Commodore Perry, a brother of the " Hero of Lake 
Erie,"* was fitted out for the purpose of carrying a letter from the President 
of the United States to the emperor of Japan, soliciting the negotiation of a 
treaty of friendship and commerce between the two nations, by which the ports 
of the latter should be thrown open to American vessels, for purposes of trade. 
The mission of Commodore Perry was highly successful. He negotiated a 
treaty, by which it was stipulated that ports on different Japanese Islands 
should be open to American commerce ;* that steamers from California to China 
should be furnished with supplies of coals; and that American sailors ship- 
wrecked on the Japanese coasts should receive hospitable treatment. Subse- 
quently a peculiar construction of the treaty on the part of the Japanese 
authorities, in relation to the permanent residence of Americans there, threat- 
ened a disturbance of the amicable relations which had been established. The 



gress ; and, because his protest was not heeded, he retired from his post, and left the duties of 
his office with Mr. Auguste Belmonte, of New York. Previous to this, Hulseman issued a 
written protest against the pohcy of our government in relation to Austria and Hungary, and 
that protest was answered, in a masterly manner, in January, 1851, by Mr. Webster, the Secre- 
tary of State. 

• Pages 47 and 453. 

' This stipulation was so construed as to allow American fishermen to catch cod within the 
large bays where they could easily carry on their avocations at a greater distance than three miles 
from any land. Such had been the common practice, without interference, until the assumption 
of exclusive right to their bays was promulgated by the British. 

^ Page 479. "" Page 487. * Page 423. 

* Previous to this, the Dutch had monopolized the trade of Japan. See note 5, page 59. 



512 THE NATION. [1852: 

matter was adjusted, and in 1860, a large and imposing embassy fiom the 
empire of Japan visited the United States. The intercourse between the two 
countries is becoming more and more intimate. 

The relations between the United States and old Spain, on acr-junt of Cuba, 
became interesting in the autumn of 1852. The Spanish authorities of Cuba, 
being thorouglily alarmed by the attempts at invasion,' and the evident sym- 
pathy in the movement of a large portion of the people f .. the United States, 
became excessively suspicious, and many little outra-j,es were committed at 
Havana, which kept alive an irritation of feeling '..consistent with social and 
commercial friendship. The idea became piovalent, in Cuba and in Europe, 
that it was the policy of the government of the United States to ultimately 
acquire absolute possession of that island, and .thus have the control over the 
commerce of the Gulf of Mexico (the door to California), and the trade of the 
"West India group of islands, which are owned, chiefly, by France and England. 
To prevent such a result, the cabinets of France and England asked that of the 
United States to enter with them into a treaty which should secure Cuba to 
Spain, by agreeing to disclaim, " now and forever hereafter, all intention ta 
obtain possession of the Island of Cuba," and " to discountenance all such 
attempts, to that effect, on the part of any power or individual whatever." 
Edward Everett, then Secretary of State, issued a response [December 1, 1852] 
to this extraordinary proposition, which the American people universally 
applauded for its keen logic and patriotic and enlightened views. He told 
France and England plainly, that the question was an American and not a 
European one, and not properly within the scope of their interference ; that 
while the United States government disclaimed all intention to violate existing 
neutrality laws, it would not relinquish the right to act in relation to Cuba 
independent of any other power ; and that it could not see with indifference 
" the Island of Cuba fall into the hands of any other power than Spain. "^ Lord 
John Russell, the English prime-minister, answered this letter [February, 
1853], and thus ended the di^jlomatic correspondence on the siibject of the 
proposed " Tripartite Treaty," as it was called. 

The most important of the closing events of Mr. Fillmore's administration 
was the creation by Congress of a new Territory called Washington, out of the 
northern part of Oregon.* The bill for this purpose became a law on the 2d of 
March, 1853, two days before Fillmore's successor, Franklin Pierce, of New 

' Pages 502 and 508. 

^ As early as 1 823, when the Spanish provinces in South America were in rebellion, or forminfi: 
into independent republics. President Monroe, in a special message upon the subject, promulgated 
the doctrine, since acted upon, that the United States ought to resist the extension of foreign 
domain or influence upon the American continent, and not allow any European government, by 
colonizing or otherwise, to gain a foothold in the New "World not already acquired. [See note 5, 
page 448,] This was directed specially against the eflbrts expected to be made by the allied 
sovereigns who had crushed Napoleon, to assist Spain against her revolted colonies in America, 
and to suppress the growth of democracy there. It became a settled policy of our government, 
and Mr, Everett reasserted it in its fullest extent. Such expression seemed to be important and 
seasonable, because it was well known that Great Britain was then making strenuous efforts to 
obtain potent influence in Central America, so as to prevent the United States from acquiring 
exclusive property in the routes across the isthmus from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean. 

' Page 478. 




irmiE iPMiEsnffiiiMir/^i tisie jAPi^jjESE emisass 



YC 



1853.J 



PIERCE'S ADMINISTRATION. 



513 



Hampshire, was inaugurated. The latter was nominated for the office by the 
Democratic convention held at Baltimore early in June, 1852, when William 
R. King, of Alabama, was named for the office of Vice-President. At the 
same place, on the 16tli of June, Winfield Scott was nominated for President 
and William A. Graham for Vice-President, by a Whig convention. The 
Democratic nominees were elected, but failing health prevented the Vice- 
President taking his seat. He died in April, 1863, at the age of sixty-eight 
years. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

PIERCE'S ADMINISTRATION. [ 1 85 3 — 1 8 5 t.] 

A DRIVING sleet tilled the air on the 4th of March, 1853, when Franklia 
Pierce,' the fourteenth President of the United States, stood upon the ruda 




^-^7^^^^^ 



platform of New Hampshire pine, erected for the purpose over the steps of th« 
eastern portico of the Federal capitol, and took the oath of office, administereij 
by Chief Justice Taney. The military display on that occasion was larger 

1 Franklin Pierce was born at Hillsborough, New Hampshire, in November, 1804. He is th« 
son of General Benjamin Pierce, an active officer in the old "W"a»' for Independence, and one of th» 
TDost useful men in New Hampshire. In 1820, when sixteen years of age, young Pierce becuM 



g-j^^ THE NATION. [1853. 

than had ever been seen in the streets of the National city, and it was estimated 
that at least twenty thousand strangers were in Washington on the morning 
of the inauguration. Untrammeled by special party pledges, the new Chief 
Magistrate entered upon the duties of liis office under pleasant auspices ; and 
his inauo-ural address, full of promises and patriotic sentiments, received the • 
general approval of his countrymen. Three days afterward [March 7] the 
Senate, in special session, confirmed his cabinet appointments.' 

The most serious difficulty which President Pierce was called upon to 
encounter, at the commencement of his administration, was a dispute concern- 
ing the boundary-line between the Mexican province of Chihuahua' and New 
Mexico.* The Mesilla valley, a fertile and extensive region, was claimed by 
both Territories ; and under the direction of Santa Anna,* who was again Presi- 
dent of the Mexican Republic in 1854, Chihuahua took armed possession of the 
disputed territory. For a time war seemed inevitable between the United 
States and Mexico. The dispute was finally settled by negotiations, and 
friendly relations have existed between the two governments ever since. 
Those relations were delicate during a large portion of the late Civil War in 
the United States, while French bayonets kept the Austrian Archduke Maxi- 
milian in the attitude of a ruler, with the title of emperor, over the Mexican 
people, whose liberties Napoleon the Third, emperor of France, was thereby 
trying to destroy. The republican government in power when Maximilian 

. — _e -— ■ — — — — 

a student in Bowdoin College, at Brunswick, Maine. He was graduated in 1824, chose law as a 
profession, and was admitted to practice at the bar in 1827. He became a warm politician, and 
partisan of General Jackson in 1828 ; and the next year, when he was twenty-five years of age, 
he was elected a memler of the Legislature of his native State. There he served four years. Ho 
was elected to Congress in 1833, and served his constituents in the House of Representatives for 
four years. In 1837, the Legislature of New Hampshire elected him to a seat in the Federal 
Senate. He resigned his seat in June, 1842, and remained in private life until 1845, when he 
was appointed United States District Attorney for New Hampshire. He was commissioned a 
Brigadier-Generhl in March, 1847, and joined the army in Mexico, under General Scott. After 
the. war lie retired from puhlio life, where he remained until called to the higliest office in the 
gift of the people. When, in the spring of 1857, he left the chair of state, he again i-etired 
into private life, and was never in public employment afterwards. He died Oct. 8, 1869. 

' WiUiam L. Marcy, Secretary of State; James GutJirie, Secretary of the Treasury; Robert 
McClelland, Secretary of the Interior; Jefferson Davis, Secretary of War; James C. Dobbin, Sec- 
retary of the Navy; James Campbell, Postmaster-General; Caleb 
Cushing, Attorney-General. 

" Note 7, page 484. 

' Page 497. 

* Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna is a native of Mexico, and first 
came into public life in 1821, during the excitements of revolution. He 
has been one of the chief revolutionists in that unhappy country. He 
was chosen President of the Republic in 1 833. After an exciting career 
as a commanding General, he was again elected President in 1841, but 
was hurled from power in 1845. After the capture of the city of Mexico 
by the Americans, under General Scott [page 494], he retired to the 
West Indies, and finally to Carthageua, Avhere he resided until 1853, 
when he returned to Mexico, and was elected President again. In the 
summer of 1854, he was accused of a design to assume imperial power, 
and violent insurrections were the consequence. These resulted in his SANTA ANNA, 

being again deprived of power, and ho has never been able to regain it. 

Much of the time since he was driven from public life he has lived in exile in Cuba, and ia 1866 
he was a resident of the United States. He went to Mexico during the earlier period of 1867. 
•when he was arrested, and thrown into prison. Few men have experienced greater vicissitude* 
than Santa Anna. He died in the city of Mexico in the spriu'^- of 18T6. 





is:-:;.] PIERCE'S ADMINISTRATION. 5^5 

came -was steadily recognized by that of the United States as the legitimate 
government of Mexico, and, diplomatically, Maximilian Avas unknown to it. 

The earlier portion of Pierce's administration was distinguished by impor- 
tant explorations by sea and land, in the interest of American commerce. The 
acquisition of California, and the marvelous rapidity with Avhich it was filling 
-with an enterprising population, opened to 
the view of statesmen an immense commer- 
cial interest on the Pacific coast, which de- 
manded the most liberal legislation. Con- 
gress seems to have comprehended the 
importance of the matter, and under its 
authority four armed vessels and a supply- 
ship sailed [May, 1853] from Norfolk, under 
Captain Ringgold, for the eastern coast of 

. . , , " p ^ TT T, 1 • i' 1 AN OCEAN STEAMSHIP. 

Asia, by the way 01 Cape Horn. Its chiei ob- 
ject was a thorough exploration of those regions of the Pacific Ocean which it waf 
then evident would soon be traversed between the ports of our own western 
frontier and the East Indies ; also of the whaling-grounds of the Kamtchatka 
iSea and Behring's Straits, on the borders ot which the United States pur- 
chased from Russia, in 1867, at the cost of $7,200,000 in gold, a large and 
important territory. Steamships had then just commenced making Stated 
and regular voyages from California to China and Japan. 

While the expedition just mentioned was away, plans were maturing for 
the construction of one or more railways across the continent, to connect, by a 
continuous line of transportation, the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Congress 
authorized surveys for such road or roads, and by midsummer [1853] four 
expeditions Avere fitted out for the purpose — one to explore from the upper 
waters of the Mississippi, at §t. Paul, to Puget's Sound, on the Pacific ; another 
to cross the continent from the Mississippi, along a line adjacent to the thirty- 
sixth parallel of latitude ; another from the Mississippi, by way of the Great 
Salt Lake, in Utah ; and a fourth from some point on the Lower Mississippi to 
the coast of Southern California, at San Pedro, Los Angelos, or San Diego. 
These expeditions performed their duties well, in the midst of great hardships,' 
and over one of the routes then explored, called the Central, which trar- 
erses Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Utah, Nevada and California, a railway 
was completed in May, 1869. Who can estimate the effect of these 
gigantic operations upon the destiny of our Republic, so connected in 
commercial relations with that "Farther India" whose wealth the civilized 
world so long coveted ? 

' At the time these explorations were going on, Colonel Fremont (see page 488) was at the 
head of a similar party among the Rocky Mountains. That exploring in the direction of the 
Great Salt Lake, was in chaKge of Captain Gunnison, of the National army. He fouad 
the Indians 'hostile when he approached the Mormon country, and among the Wasatch 
mountains tliey Ml upon the explorers and killed a number of them, mcluding the leader. 
Fremont's party suffered dreadfully for want of food in the midst of deep snow. For forty-fiya 
days they fed on the meat of exhausted mules which they slew, and every particle was devoured, 
even the entrails ! They were met and saved by another party in February, 1854. 



516 



THE NATION. 



[1853, 



While the government was putting forth its energies in preparing the way 
for the triumph of American commerce, private enterprise was busy in the 
promotion of general industry, and in the noble work of international fraternity 
in the great interest of Labor, In the year 1851, an immense building, com- 
posed of iron and glass, was created in Hyde Park, London, under royal 
patronage, for the purpose of giving an exhibition of the results of the industry 
of all nations. It was a World's Fair, and representatives of every civilized 
nation on the globe were there mingling together as brothers of one family, and 
all equally interested in the perfection of each other's productions. The idea 
was one of great moral grandeur, for it set an insignia of dignity upon labor, 
hitherto withheld by those who bore scepters and orders. There men of all 
nations and creeds received a lesson upon the importance of brotherhood among 
the children of men, such as the pen and tongue could not teach. For the 
conception and consummation of that noble work, mankind will forever revere 
its author. Prince Albert, the husband of Queen Victoria. The enterprise waa 
repeated in this country in 1853, when, at the expense of the money and' 

___________ energy of private republicans, a- 

^7"^"^^^^^" '^,'"iM " Crystal Palace" was built and 
a " World's Fair'" was held in 
the city of New York. It was 
opened in July of that year, with 
'mposing ceremonies, led by the 
Chief Magistrate of the nation.' 
The emperor of the French has 
twice imitated the act of the 
British queen and her consort. 
During the spring and summer 
of^l867, an immense "World's 
Fair " was open in Paris. These were important historical events, for they 
marked a new and most promising epoch in the annals of mankind. They 
have since been repeated.'* History often has better stories to tell than those of 
wars and military conquests, and tlie rise and fall of dynasties and empires. 




CRYSTAL PALACE IN NEW YORK. 



^ On that occasion, a prayer was made by Dr. "Wainwright, provisional bishop of the Protest- 
ant Episcopal Church in the diocese of New York (since deceased) ; an address was pronounced 
by Theodore Sedgwick, president of the Association by which the building was erected ; and on 
the 1 6th of the month, a grand entertainment was given by the directors to distinguished guests, 
among whom were the President of the United States and members of his cabinet, Sir Charles 
LyeH, the eminent English geologist, and others. 

One of the speakers on that occasion [Elihu Burritt] said : " Worthy of the grandest circum- 
stances which could be thrown around a human assembly, worthy of this occasion and a hundred 
like this, is that beautiful idea, the coronation of Labor. * * * Not American labor, not 
British labor, not French labor, not the labor of the New "World or the Old, but the labor of man- 
kind as one undivided brotherhood — labor as the oldest, the noblest prerogative of duty and 
humanity." And Rev. E. H. Chapin closed with the beautiful invocation: "0! genius of Art, fill 
us with the inspiration of still higher and more spiritual beauty. ! instruments of invention, 
enlarge our dominion over reality. Let iron and fire become as blood and muscle, and in this 
electric net-work let heart and brain inclose the world with truth and sympathy. And thou, 
01 beautiful dome of Ught, suggeativ* of the brooding future, the future of human love and divine' 
communion, expand and spread above the tribes of men a canopy broad as the earth, and glorious 
as the upper heaven." " See page 746. 



1853.] riERCE'S ADMINISTRATION. 5^^^ 

Wheu tlie Thirty-third Congress assembled, on the first Monaay in Decem- 
ber, 1853, a greater degree of good feeling seemed to prevail among the mem- 
bers than had been exhibited for the several preceding years, when the chief 
topics of their deliberations were connected with the subject of Slavery. The 
■country "was at peace and amity with all the world, as a general proposition,' 
and the people looked to their representatives for the conception and adoption 
of measures for the public welfare, which the circumstances of the nation 
required. The construction of a raihvay across the continent was expected to 
absorb much of their attention. Important treaties were pending between our 
government and those of Mexico and Central America, concerning territoiy 
and inter-oceanic communications across the Isthmus between North and South 
America ; also concerning boundary-lines in the region of New Mexico and 
California. 

There was an interest, too, far away in the Pacific, that demanded serious 
consideration. The government of the Sandwich Islands was then making 
earnest overtures for annexing that ocean empire to our republic. This was a 
matter of great moment, for these Islands are destined to be of vast impor- 
tance in the operations of the future commerce of the Pacific Oeean. A large 
' majority of the white people there are Americans by birth ; and the govern- 
ment, in all its essential operations, is controlled by Americans, notwithstand- 
ing the ostensible ruler is a native sovereign. The consuls of France and 
England, when they perceived a disposition on the part of the reigning 
monarch to have his domain annexed to the United States, charged the scheme 
upon certain American missionaries, and ofiicially pi-otested against their 
alleged conduct. They declared that France and England would not remain 
indifferent spectators of such a movement. The missionaries, as well as the 
United States commissioner, disclaimed any tampering with the native authori- 
ties on the subject ; at the same time, the latter, in a jiublished reply to the 

' There was a little feeling of hostility between our government and that of Austria for a while 
in 1853, but it soon subsided. It grew out of a circumstance connected with the exercise of the 
power of our government in defense of a citizen of foreign birth in a foreign port, as follows: 
When Austria, by aid of Russia, crushed the rebellion in Hungary, in 1848, many of the active 
patriots became exiles in foreign lands. A large number came to the United States, and many 
of them became naturalized citizens — that is, after due legal preparation, took an oath to support 
the Constitution and laws of the United States, and to perform faithfully all the duties of a citizen. 
One of these, named Martin Koszta, a native of Hungary, had taken such steps. While engaged 
in business at Smyrna, on the Mediterranean, he was seized, by order of the Austrian consul- 
general, and taken on Ijoard an Austrian brig, to be conveyed to Trieste as a rebel refugee, not- 
withstanding he carried an American protection. Captain Ingraham, of the United States sloop- 
■ of- war Si. Louis, then lying in the harbor of Smyrna, immediately claimed Koszta as an American 
• citizen. On the refusal of the Austrian authorities to release the prisoner, Ingraham cleared his 
vessel for action [July 2], and threatened to fire upon the brig if Koszta was not delivered up 
within a given time. The Austrians yielded to the powerful arguments of forty well-shotted 
■cannon, and Kdszta was placed in the custody of the French consul, to await the action of the 
respective governments. Ingraham's course was everywhere applauded ; and Congress signified 
its approbation by voting him an elegant sword. The pride of the Austrian government was 
^severely wounded, and it issued a protest against the proceedings of Captain Ingraham, and sent 
it to all tlie European courts. Mr. Hulseman, the Austrian minister at Washington, demanded 
;an apology, or other redress, from our government, and menaced the United States with the dis- 
pleasure of his royal master. But no serious diflSculty occurred. It was plainly perceived that 
the Austrians were in the wrong; and Koszta^ under the protection of the United States flag, 
returned to this land of free opinions. 



518 ' THE NATION. [1854. 

protest, denied the right of foreign governments to interfere to prevent such 
a result, if it sliould be deemed mutually desirable. Preliminary negotiations 
were commenced, and a treaty was actually formed, when, on the 15th of 
December, 1854, King Kamehameha died, at the age of forty-nine years, and 
was succeeded by his son. Prince Alexander Liholiho. The new king imme- 
diately ordered the discontinuance of negotiations with the United States, and 
the subject of annexation was not revived until after the visit of Emma, 
Queen of the Islands, to England and the United States, in 1866. That such 
annexation will finally occur, seems to be prohesied by the history of the past 
and the teachings of the present. 

Just as the preliminaries were arranged in Congress for entering vigorously 
upon the business of the session, the chairman of the Senate Committee on 
Territories (Mr. Douglas, of Illinois) presented a bill [Jan., 1854] which dis- 
turbed the harmony in Congress, and the quietude of the people. In the center 
of our continent is a vast region, almost twice as large, in territorial extent, as 
the original thirteen States,' stretching between Missouri, Iowa, and Minne- 
sota, and the Pacific Territories, from the thirty-seventh parallel of north lati- 
tude to the British possessions,'^ and embracing one-fourth of all the public 
lands of the United States. The bill alluded to proposed to erect this vast 
region into two Territories, the southern portion, below the fortieth parallel, to 
be named Kansas, and the northern and larger portion, JVebraska. The bill 
contained a provision which Avould nullify the Compromise of 1820,^ and allow 
the inhabitants of those Territories to decide for themselves whether they 
would have the institution of slavery or not. This proposition surprised Con- 
gress and the whole country, and it became a subject of discussion throughout 
the Union. The slavery agitation was aroused in all its strength and rancor, 
and the whole North became violently excited. Public meetings were held by 
men of all parties, and petitions and remonstrances against the measure, 
especially in its relation to JVebraska, wei-e poured into the Senate,* while the 
debate on the subject was progressing, from the 30th of January [1854] until 
the 3d of March. On the latter day the bill passed that body by the decisive 
vote of thirty-seven to fourteen. The measure encountered great opposition ia 
the House of Representatives ; and by means of several amendments, its final 
defeat seemed almost certain, and the excitement subsided. 

At about this time a bill was reported in the Senate [March 10], providing 
for the construction of a railway to the Pacific Ocean ; and on the same day 
when the Nebraska Bill passed that body [March 3d], the House of Represen- 
tatives adopted one called the Homestead Bill, which provided that any free 
white male citizen, or any one who may have declared his intentions to become 
one previous to the passage of this act, might select a quarter section [one 
hundred and sixty acres] of land on the public domain, and on proof being 
given that he had occupied and cultivated it for five years, he might receive 



' Page 174. « Page 480. » Page 452. 

* A petition against the measure was presented to the Senate immediately after the passage- 
of the bill by tliat body, signed by three thousand clergymen of New England. 



1854.] PIERCE'S ADMINISTRATION. 519 

a title to it in fee, without being required to pay any thing for it. This bill 
was discussed in both Houses for several Aveeks ; and finally an amendment, 
graduating the prices of all the public lands, was adopted in its stead.' The 
public mind had become comparatively tranquil when, on the 9th of May 
[1854], the Nebraska bill was again called up in the House of Representatives. 
It became the absorbing subject for discussion. During a fortnight, violent 
debates, with great acrimony of feeling, occurred, and on one occasion there 
was a session of thirty-six consecutive hours' duration, when an adjournment 
took place in the midst of great confusion. The country, meanwhile, was 
much excited, for the decision of the question was one of great moment in its 
relation to the future. While it was pending the suspense became painful. 
But it did not last long. The final question was taken on the 22d, and the 
bill was passed by a vote of one hundred and thirteen to one hundred. Three 
days afterward [May 25], the Senate agreed to it as it came from the House 
by a vote of thirty-five to thirteen, and it received the signature of the Presi- 
dent on the last day of May.^ 

New difficulties with the Spanish authorities of Cuba' appeared, while the 
Nebraska subject Avas luider discussion. Under cover of some pretense, the 
American steamship. Black Warrior^ was seized in the harbor of Havana 
[February 28, 1854], and the vessel and cargo were declared confiscated. The 
outrage was so flagrant, that a proposition was immediately submitted to the 
lower House of Congress to suspend the neutrality laws,* and compel the 
Havana officials to behave properly. Under the provisions of such laws, any 
number of citizens of the United States, who may be engaged in hostilities 
against Spain, would forfeit the protection of their government, and become 
liable to punishment for a violation of law. It was on this account that Crit- 
tenden and his party were shot at Havana,' without the right of claiming the 
interference of the government of the United States in their behalf The Presi- 
dent sent a special messenger to the government at Madrid, with instructioni 
to the American minister to demand immediate redress, in the form of indem- 
nity to the owners of the JBlack Warrior. But the Spanish government justi- 
fied the act of the Cuban authorities, when such formal demand was made. In 

' It provided that all lands which had been in market ten years should be subject to entry at 
one dollar per acre; fifteen years, at seventy-five cents; and so on, in tlie same ratio — those 
irhich had been in market for thirty 3'ears being offered at twelve and a half cents. It also pro- 
Tided that every person availing himself of the act should make affidavit that he entered the 
land for his own use; and no one could acquire more than three hundred and twenty acres, or 
two quarter-sections. 

' A few days after the final passage of the Nebraska bill, the city of Boston was made a 
theater of great excitement, by the arrest of a fugitive slave there, and a deputy-marshal was shot 
dead, during a riot. United States troops from Rhode Island were employed to sustain the officers 
of the law, and a local military force was detailed, to assist in the protection of the court and the 
parties concerned, until the proceedings in the case should be completed. The United States 
Commissioner decided in favor of the claimant of the slave, and he was conveyed to Virginia by a 
government vessel. This commotion in Boston is known as the Burns Riot — the name of the 
fugitive slave being Burns. 

' Page 502. 

* These are agreements (still existing) made between the governments of the United States 
and Old Spain, to remain neutral or inactive, when either party should engage in war with 
another. 

' Page 508. 



520 THE NATION. [1854. 

the mean while the perpetrators of the outrage became alarmed, and the Cap- 
tain-General (or Governor) of Cuba, with pretended generosity, offered to give 
up the vessel and cargo, on the payment by the owners of a fine of six thou- 
sand dollars. They complied, but under protest.' The matter was finally 
settled amicably between the governments of the United States and Spain,' and 
since then nothing has materially disturbed the friendly relations between the 
two countries. 

The irritation caused by the difficulties with Cuban officials was made the 
pretext, after the passage of the Nebraska bill, for a conference of three of the 
American ministers plenipotentiary in Europe. In August [1854], the Presi- 
dent directed Mr. Buchanan, then American embassador at London, Mr. Mason, 
embassador at Paris, and Mr. Soule, embassador at Madrid, to meet at some 
"convenient place, to confer upon the best means of settling the difficulties about 
Cuba, and gaining possession of the island, by purchase or otherwise. They 
accordingly met at Ostend, a seaport town in Belgium, on the 9th of October, 
1854. After remaining there three days, they adjourned to Aix-la-Chapelle, in 
Rhenish Prussia, and from thence, on the 18th of the same month, they 
addressed a letter to the United States government, Avhich embodied their 
views. That letter is known in history as The Ostend Circular, and is 
regarded as one of the most disgraceful passages in the history of American 
diplomacy. Its arguments were the plea of the highway robber, enforced by 
the doctrine that " Might makes Right." It recommended the lyurchase of 
Cuba, if possible ; if not, the acquisition of it by force. " If Spain," said the 
authors of that infamous letter, " actuated by stubborn pride and a false sense 
"of honor, should refuse to sell Cuba to the United States," then " by every 
law, human and divine, we shall be justified in wresting it from Spain, if we 
possess the power." The bald iniquity of the proposition amazed honest 
people in both hemispheres. Why it should have been left unrebuked by the 
government at Washington was a mystery which the light of subsequent 
events revealed. It seems clear, in that light, that it was a part of the scheme 
of those disunionists who, a few years later, attempted to destroy the Repub- 
lic, that they might establish a dazzling empire whose corner-stone should be 
Human Slavery, of which they dreamed, and which they promised their 
deluded followers — an empire which was to be comprised within what they 
called The Golden Circle^ whose center was Havana, the capital of Cuba.* 

' Protesting against an act which a party i.s compelled to perform, leaves the matter open for a 
future discussion and final settlement. 

"^ The President of the United States, having bee li informed that expeditions were preparing in 
different parts of the Union, for the purpose of invading Cuba, issued a proclamation again.st such 
movements, on the 1st of June, 1S54, and called upon all good citizens to respect the obhgations 
of existing treaties, between the governments of our Republic and Spain. 

^ The Golden Circle, as defined by these disunionists, had a radius of sixteen degrees of latitude 
and longitude, with its center at Havana. It will be perceived, by drawing that circle on a map, 
that it included the Slave-labor States of our Republic. It reached northward to the Pennsyl- 
Tauia line, and southward to the Isthmus of Darien. It embraced the West India Islands, and 
those of the Caribbean Sea, with a greater part of Mexico and Central America. The plan of the 
disuniouists seems to have been, first, to secure Cuba, and then the other islands of that tropical 
region, with Mexico and Central America ; and then to sever the Slave-labor and the Free-labor States 
•f our Republic, making the former a part of the great empire, whose corner-stone, as one of the 



1854.] PIERCE'S ADMINISTRATION. 521 

While the good name of the government was suffering at the hands of 
•unfaithful citizens, who were plotting mischief against its weaker neighbors, 
some salutary measures were adopted which gave a little relief to the picture 
of that dark period in our history. While a conspiracy for obliterating the 
boundary-line between the United States and Mexico, by blotting out tlie 
nationality of the latter, was fast ripening, the two governments successfully 
negotiated a treaty by which that boundary was defined and fixed. The treaty 
was ratified early in 1854, and it was agreed that the decision of the commis- 
sioners appointed to run the boundary should be final. By that treaty the 
United States were to be released from all obligations imposed by the treaty 
of Guadalupe Hidalgo,' to defend the Mexican frontier against the Indians, 
and as a consideration for this release, and for the territory ceded by Mexico, 
the United States agreed to pay to the latter ten millions of dollars — seven 
millions on the ratification of the treaty, and the remainder as soon as the 
boundary-line should be established. These conditions were complied with, 
and a good understanding between the two governments has ever since 
existed. 

At about the same time, a reciprocity treaty was negotiated between the 
United States and Great Britain, Avhich lowered, and in some instances effaced, 
the barriers to free commerce between the British provinces in America and 
•our Republic. It provided that the fisheries of the provinces, excepting those 
of Newfoundland,'- should be open to American citizens ; that disputes respect- 
ing fisheries should be settled by arbitration ; that the British should have a 
right to participate in the American fisheries as far as the 36th degree of north 
latitude, and that there should be free commerce between the provinces and 
the United States, in floui-, breadstuffs, fruits, fish, animals, lumber, and a 
variety of natural productions in their unmanufactured state. It stipulated 
that the St. Lawrence River and the Canadian canals should be thrown open 
to American vessels ; and the United States government agreed to urge the 
respective States to admit British vessels into their canals, upon similar terms. 
This treaty was submitted to the provincial Legislatures, and to the govern- 
ments of the contracting powers, and was ratified by all. The arrangement 
was terminated, in accordance with the j^rovisions of the treaty, early in 1866, 

When the Fugitive Slave Law began to bear the bitter fruit which its 
author, James M. Mason, of Virginia, desired and exjjected f when the Kansas- 



less reticent of their number avowed, was to be human slavery. A secret association, known 
as the Order of the Lone Star, and another subsequently organized as its successor, whose 
members were called Knights of the Gotden Circle, wei-e lormed for the purpose of eorruptiug 
the people and carrying out the iniquitous design. The latter played a conspicuous part in 
the Civil War which broke out in 1861, as the secret friends and efficient allies of the dis- 
tmiouists, who were making open war on the Republic. 

\ Page 497. 2 -p^^^ ^r^^ 

Senator Mason, one of the most persistent of these disunionists who brought about the 
late Civil War, was the author of this Act. The writer was informed bv a personal acquain- 
tance of Mason, at Winchester, that the Senator declared to him that he made the law as ob- 
noxious as possible to the people of the Free-Labor States, in order tliat it should excite uni- 
versal disgust and opposition, and cause such violations of it, and a general refusal to comply 
with its repulsi\e requirements, as to give a plausible pretext to the slaveholders to revolt and 
attempt to dissolve the Union. 




522 THE X ATI OK. [1854. 

Nebraska bill hud opened afresh the agitation of the Slavery question, and when 
the extraoidinary declaration of the '• Ostend Circular" appeared to give no of- 
fense to the Chief Magistrate of the nation and 
his advisers, the disunioujsts planned more ac- 
tively and worked more boldly than ever. The 
" Great Idea of the Age," as they called it, was 
the extension of the area of slavery, by the 
conquest and annexation of countries adjacent 
to our Republic. Their attempts on Cuba 
'were baffled, and they turned their attention, 
■to Mexico and Central America. Their ope- 
• rations at first assumed the form of emigra- 
tion schemes, and their first theater was a 
region on the great Isthmus, inhabited chiefly 
by a race of degraded natives, and belonging 
to the State of Nicaragua, known as the Mos- 
jAMEs M. MASON. quito coast. It promised to be a territory of 

great importance in a commercial point of view.' Under the specions pretext 
that the British were likely to possess it, armed citizens of the United States, 
appealing to the Monroe doctrine^ for justification, emigrated to that region. 
Already the great guns of the American navy had been heard on the Mosquito 
shore, as a herald of coming power.' 

It was in the autumn and early winter of 1854 that the first formidable 
*' emigration " to the Mosquito country w' as undertaken. It was alleged that 



' A railway across the Isthmus of Panama has been constructed. The first trains passed 
over it, from Aspinwall to Panama, on the 28th of January, 1855. The project of a ship-canal 
across the Isthmus of Darien. or Panama, has occupied the attention of statesmen and commercial 
men for many years. The first actual exploration of the Isthmus, witli a view to cutting a ship- 
canal across it, was made in 1853, by a party of twenty-three, under the direction of William 
Kennish, of New York. They were sent out by J. C. Prevost, commander of the British steam- 
ship Virago, in pursuance of orders from the commander of tlie British squadron then in the 
Pncific. They commenced on the Pacific coast, and traveled northward to the Atlantic shore. 
For ten days "they traversed a dense forest, which covered a fine, fertile, and -well- watered plain, 
■which at no time rose more than fifty feet above the level of the sea. The party became short 
of provisions ; and having separated for some prudent purpose, a portion of them were murdered 
and plundered by the Indians. The survivors returned to the Virago, witliout accomplishing 
mucli. In Januarv, 1S54, Lieutenant Strain, of the United States Navy, with a party of twenty, 
started from the A tlantic side to explore the Isthmus. They suffered dreadfully ; and as nothing 
was heard from them for several weeks, it was supposed tliat all had perished. Their provisions 
became exhausted, and some died from famine. The Indians, however, did not molest them, but 
fled to the mountains. When Lieutenant Strain and the survivors reached the Pacific coast, they 
were destitute of both clothing and food. Other explorations have been made by officers of 
the United States service, but no result has been reached. 

' See note 2, page 512. 

=* There was a little village on the Mosquito coast called Greytown, in which some American 
citizens resided. These alleged that they had been outraged by the local authorities, who professed 
to derive their power directly from the Mosquito king, or chief of the native tribes. An appeal was 
made to the counuander of a vessel of the United States nav}', then lying near. That sliallow 
official, named IloUius, who was always valiant when there was no danger, actually bombarded 
the little town, as a punishment for tlie acts of its autliorities. This brought out tlie denuncia- 
tions of English residents, who alleged that, by arrangements witli the Mosquito monarch, their 
irovernment was the protector of his dominions. The British government itself assumed that 
position, and for a wdiOe the folly of IloUins caused expectations of serious difficulty. 



1855.] PIERCE'S A D M IN IS T R A T I X^ . 503 

a large tract of the territory had been granted by tlie ^Mosquito king to two 
British subjects," and upon this, by arrangement, the emigrants, led by Colonel 
H, L, Kinney, proceeded to settle. The government of Nicaragua protested 
against this invasion of that State, in violation of the neutrality laws of the 
United States. The Nicaraguan minister at Washington called the attention 
of our government to the subject [January 16, 1855], and especially to the fact 
of the British claim to political jurisdiction there, and urged that the United 
States, while asserting the " Monroe doctrine " as a correct political dogma, 
could not sanction the act complained of, as it was done under guarantees of 
British authority. Our government, as a matter of policy, interfered, but with 
a mildness that^allowed the emigration scheme to go on, and assume more for- 
midable proportions and aspects. 

An agent of the filli busters named William Walker, who had already, with 
a few followers, invaded the State of Sonora, Mexico, from California, and been 
repulsed, reappeared on the theater in connection with Kinney, who invited 
him to assist him " in improving the lands and developing the mineral 
resources " of his grant on Lake Nicaragua. Ostensibly for that purpose,. 
Walker left San Francisco Avith three hundred men, and arrived on the coast 
of Nicaragua on the 27th of June. He cast off all disguise the next day, and 
attempted to capture the town of Rivas, believing that one of the factions 
opposed to the Nicaraguan government, which he proposed to unite himself 
with^, would aid in his scheme. In this he was mis-taken. Even one hundred 
and fifty Central Americans, who had joined him, imder General Castillon,, 
deserted when they saw the forces of Nicaragua approaching. It was with 
great difficulty that Walker and his followers retreated to the coast and es- 
caped in a schooner. 

Walker, who appears to have been a special favorite of Jefferson Davis, 
the chief leader of the Confederates in the late Civil War (and who was then 
the Secretary of War and ruling spirit in President Pierce's cabinet), was not 
allowed to remain idle, for the scheme to open Central America to the slave 
system of our Southern States^ was to be consummated, as far as possible, while 
that functionary was in power in the government and could have its sanction 
to the practical operations of the doctrine of the " Ostend Circular." Walker 
accordingly made his appearance again on the soil of Nicaragua, with armed 
followers, in August ; and on the 5th of September following [1855] the 

' For some time the British had been endeavoring to obtain a controlling influence in this 
region, and they had induced the ctiief of the Mosquito nation to assume authority inde'- 
pendent of the State of Nicaragua. 

^ While, so early as 1850, Davis and his political friends were evidently fostering the 
scheme for seizing Cuba, that it might become a part of the slave empire already alluded to, 
they appear to have been planning for the seizure of the Central American States for the same 
purpose, and in this project the obsequious politicians of the North who were ever ready to pro- 
mote the slave-holding interests were in complicity. A month before the sailing of the Cuban 
expedition under'Lopez [see page 508], a Pennsylvanian, named John Brodhead, in a letter to 
Davis, expressed his desire to be appointed a minister to Nicaragua, saying : " I should like 
to go into that country and help open it to civilization and niggers, l could get strong re- 
commendations from the President's (Taylor's) special friends in Pennsylvania for the jilace, 
were the mission vacant, and I think I would prove a live minister. I am tired of being a 
white slave in the North, and long for a home m the sunny South," President Taylor was 
Secretary Davis's father-in-law. 



^24 THE NATION. - '- [1855 

"emigrants" in the Mosquito country, assuming independence of Nicaragi'..^ 
organized a civil government there by the appointment of Kinney as cliiel' 
magistrate, with a council of five assistants. At that time the inhabitants of 
Nicaragua were in a state of revolution, and the government was weak. 
Taking advantage of t,his state of things, Walker pushed his scheme of armed 
occupation vigorously. He fought and vanquished [September 3, 1855] four 
hundred government troops at Virgin Bay, and marched triumphantly upon 
and captured Grenada [October 12], the capital of the State. Then he placed 
Oeneral Rivas, a Nicaraguan, in the Presidential chair; treated Kinney with 
contempt, and drove him from his Mosquito domain, and busied himself in 
strengthening his military power by "emigrants" from the United States. A 
British consul recognized the ncAV government of Nicaragua, and John H. 
Wheeler,' the American minister resident there, gave it the nurturp of the sun- 
shine of his kindly regard. 

This attempt to establish a political power in Central America, by armed 
adventurers from the United States, created alarm among the other govern- 
ments on the Isthmus, and in the winter of 1856 an alliance of those States 
again&t Nicaragua under its foreign usurpers was attempted. Early in March 
•Costa Rica made a formal declaration of war against that State ; and on the 
10th of the same month Walker, who was the real head of the new govern- 
ment, made a corresponding declaration against Costa Rica. The latter called 
upon all the Central American States to " unite and destroy the invaders from 
the North," while Walker shamelessly declared that he was there by invitation 
■of the liberal party in Nicaragua. Hostilities commenced on the 20th of 
March. The Costa Ricans marched into Nicaragua, and on the 11th of April 
a sanguinary conflict occurred, in which Walker's troops were victorious, and 
the invaders were driven from the State. This made the usurper arrogant. 
He levied a forced loan on the people in support of his power. General Rivas,* 
becoming disgusted with him, finally abdicated the presidency, abandoned 
Walker, and proclaimed against him. Tliis was followed on the 24th of June 
[1856] by a new election for President, when Walker received two-thirds of 
the popular vote. On the 12th of July he was inaugurated President of 
Nicaragua, and thus the first grand act of the conspiracy against our weak 
neighbors was accomplished. The government at Washington hastened to 
0,cknowledge the new natiou, and Walker's embassador, in the person of a 

' John H. Wheeler was a resident of western North CaroHna, and while on his way to New 
York, to embark for Nicaragua, two of his slaves, who attended him, were detained in Philadel- 
phia [July 18, 1855], through the instrumentality of persons there who sought to make them 
free. One of these (Passmore Williamson) was ordered by Judge Kane (father of Dr. Kane, the 
Arctic explorer), of the United States District Court, to bring the slaves before him. Williamson 
•declared that the slaves had never been in his custody, and of course he could not produce them. 
On motion of Colonel Wheeler, Judge Kane committed Williamson to prison, for contempt of 
court, where he remained for several months. This case, in connection with -other questions la 
regard to slavery, produced great excitement throughout the country. Williamson, after hit 
reloa.se, prosecuted Kane for false imprisonment. 

- Rivas, who, by Walker's power, had been made President of Nicaragua, as we have 
seen, had sent a minister to Washington namea Parker H. French. The Government 
refused to receive him. Davis's scheme was not ripe, and would not be until Walker, his pliant 
instrument of mischief, was at the head of the government, with an army at liis back. 



1855.] PIERCE'S ADMINISTRATION. 525 

Roman Catholic priest named Vigil, was cordially received b)'' President 
Pierce and his cabinet. Thus strengthened, Walker ruled with a high hand, 
offending commercial nations by his interference with trade. The other Cen- 
tral American States coalesced against him, when he declared all their ports in 
a -state of blockade ; and he performed other acts whi>ch showed his innate 
weakness, and led to his ruin. 

For about two years Walker held jDossession of Nicaragua by hard strug- 
gling, but the combined power of the other states finally crushed him. On 
the 20th of May, 1857, he was compelled to surrender two hundred men, the 
remnant of his army, at Rivas, and by the interposition of Commodore Davis, 
of our navy, then on that coast, he and a few of his followers were brought 
away unharmed. So soon as he arrived at New Orleans, he commenced fit- 
ting out another Nicaraguan expedition. He left there in November, 1857, 
and on the 25th of that month he landed at Puenta Arenas, Avhere Commodore 
Paulding, of our navy, seized him [Dec. 3] and two hundred and thirty-two of 
his followers, and took Walker to New York as a prisoner. James Buchanan 
was then President of the United States. He privately commended Pauld- 
ing's act,' but " for prudential reasons," he said — that is, to avoid giving offense 
to the slavery propagandists — he publicly condemned the Commodore, in a 
special message to Congress [January 7, 1858], for thiis "violating the sove- 
reignty of a foreign coiintry !" He declined to hold Walker as a prisoner, 
and then that willing agent of our Secretary of War and his friends was allowed 
to freely traverse the slave-labor States, preaching a new crusade against Cen- 
tral America, and collecting funds for the purpose of a new invasion. Walker 
sailed from Mobile with a third expedition, and was arrested off the mouths of 
the Mississippi, but only for having left port without a clearance ! He was 
tried by the United States Court at New Orleans and acquitted, when he re- 
commenced operations, went again to Central America, made much mischief, 
and was finally captured and shot at Truxillo. Thus ended one of the first 
acts in the sad drama of the late Civil War. 

While these fillibustering movements were in progress on our Southern 
frontier, the attention of the government was called to other important matters. 
Among these was a war by the Indians upon the white settlers in the Territo- 
ries of Oregon and Washington, on the Pacific coast, tOAvard the close of 1855, 
caused, in a great measure, by the bad conduct of government agents and 
speculators ; and probably in a measure by the machinations of their English 
neighbors.' United States troops were sent to suppress hostilities, but they 
failed to accomplish it. They were defeated in battle, and not long afterward 



' Oral statement to the author by Commodore Tatnall (late of the United States Navy), at 
Sackett's Harbor, New Tork, in July, 1860. Tatnall expressed much indignation at this dis- 
graceful conduct of the President, so calculated to demoralize the public service, and said: — "Few 
of us will be likely to do our duty hereafter for fear of punishment, by public censure, while the 
hand that inflicts it gives us a certificate of private approval." 

* Circumstancea seemed to give the color of justice to the suspicion, that the savages were 
incited to war on the settlements by persons connected with the English Hudsov^s Bay Company, 
who had married Indian women, and who were desirous of monopolizing the fur-trade of thai 
region. 



526 THE NATION. [1855. 

several white families were murdered by the savages. Finally, Major-General 
Wool,' then stationed at San Francisco, proceeded to Portland, in Oregon, to 
organize a campaign against them. The Indians had formed a powerful com- 
bination, and during the winter and spring of 1855-'56, hostilities were so gen- 
eral in both Territories, that it appeared at one time as if the settlers would be 
compelled to abandon the country. This " Indian trouble," as it was called, 
was brought to a close in Oregon during the ensuing summer, but there was 
restlessness observed everywhere among the savage tribes westward of the 
Rocky Mountains. 

The friendly relations between our Government and that of Great Britain 
were slightly disturbed early in 1855, by the enlistment, in the United States, 
of recruits for the British army, then, in connection with a French army, at 
war with the Russians on the Crimean Peninsula. It was done under the 
sanction of British officials in this country, in violation of our neutrality laws. 
In this business the British minister at Washington was implicated, and our 
government demanded his recall. The British government refused compli- 
ance. After waiting patiently several months, while diplomatic correspond- 
ence was going on, the President dismissed the offending minister ; also the 
British consuls at New York, Philadelphia, and Cincinnati, who had been 
guilty of a similar offense. Irritation followed these measures for a while, but 
law and equity so clearly vindicated the action of the United States, that a 
new minister was soon sent to Washington, and friendly feeling was restored. 

The most prominent events to be considered in the history of the adminis- 
tration of President Pierce and his immediate successor, are what may be 
called the preliminary skirmishes befox-e the late great and final battle waged 
between the powers of Slavery and Freedom. The former, made bold and trucu- 
lent by success, was rapidly bringing not only the government, the commerce, 
and the varied industries of the Republic in abject subserviency at its feet, but 
was making the conscience of the nation, as manifested in morals and religion, 
plastic in its hands, and giving it its own shape and proclivities. The Chief 
Magistrate at that time appeared to sympathize with its sentiments, and smile 
complacently upon its deeds ; and so, having disposed, as it thought, of all its 
serious opponents, it began to work its will Avith a high hand, apparently 
unconscious of the fact that there were moral forces at work in opposition, 
which, like those of the material universe, are sometimes, though invisible, 
intangible, and latent, more potent in action than those which are seen and 
felt. That such forces existed was speedily made manifest. 

The virtual repeal of the Missouri Compromise Act'' and the passage of the 
Kansas-Nebraska Act^ left all the territory of the Republic open to the social 
institutions of every section of the Union. The question immediately arose, 
Shall the domain of the Republic be the theater of all free or all slave labor, 
with the corresponding civilization of each as a consequence? It was evident 
that one or the other of these social systems must prevail, for the antagonism 
was so pronounced that one or the other must immediately yield. That ques- 

' Pages 413 and 484. ' Pages 452 and 501. * Pa«e 518. 



1855.] piekce's administration. 527 

tion was scarcely uttered, when positive action proceeded to answer it. The 
power alluded to, complacently viewing its conquests, and the abjectness of 
its captives in its presence,' had no doubt of its supremacy, for on the sur- 
face of society there seemed to be only slight ripples to indicate the agitation 
of serious opposition. So it sounded the trumpet for battle, and the newly 
organized Territory of Kansas was its chosen field of conflict. 

The offensive Fugitive Slave Act, and the aggressions and arrogance of its 
upholders, had aroused the Christian manhood of the nation, and the Cham- 
pion of Wrong, to its own utter astonishment, saw the gauntlet it had cast 
down immediately taken up boldly by the Champion of Right. The latter 
commenced the contest with the peaceful weapon of the ballot-box. Suddenly 
emigration began to flow in a copious stream from the free-labor States, and 
especially from New England, into the new Territory. It was obvious that the 
settlers there from those States would soon out-vote those from the slave-labor 
States, and the dominant power thus far, alarmed and exasperated, began to 
organize physical forces in Missouri, to counteract the moral forces of its oppo- 
nent, if necessary. Combinations were formed under various titles,^ and both 
parties founded settlements and planted the seeds of towns.^ The government 
put forth its strength in that direction in October, 1854, when A. H. Reeder, 
appointed Governor of the Territory, arrived, and took measures for the elec- 
tion of a territorial legislature. 

With the election of members for a legislature, at the close of March, 1855, 
the struggle in Kansas fairly commenced. The men from the Free-labor States 
plainly perceived that they must contend against fraud and violence in every 
form. The Missouri slave-holders were prepared to go into the Territory and 
secure the election of men in sympathy with them. Already in November 
[1854], when a delegate to Congress was elected, out of nearly twenty-nine 
hundred votes cast, over seventeen hundred were put in by Missourians who 



' Merchants having a large "Southern trade," have confessed that for some time before the 
breaking out of the late civil war, they were careful not lo allow the New York Tribune, and sim- 
ilar publications that advocated the righteousness of freedom for all, to be seen in their stores 
when their "Southern" customers were there! 

* They were respectively called "Social Band," "Friend's Society," "Blue Lodge," -"The 
Sons of the South," et cetera. So early as the 24th of July, 1854, or about two weeks after the 
repeal of the Missouri Compromise Act, an "Emigrant Aid Society," under an act of incorpora- 
tion by the Legislature of Massachusetts, in April previous, when the cloud of difficulty was 
gathering, was formed in Boston, and was efficient in sending settlers to Kansas. This move- 
ment created great exasperation among the slave-holders, and at a meeting held at Westport, 
Missouri, early in July [1 854], it was resolved that Missourian-s, who formed the associations there 
represented, should he ready at all times to assist, when called upon by pro-slavery citizens in 
Kansas, to remove from the Territory by force every person who should attempt to settle the"** 
" under the auspices of the N"orthern Emigrant Society." They recommended the slave-holders 
of other counties in Missouri to take similar action. 

^ The settlers from Free-labor States founded the towns of Lawrence, Topeka, Boston (after- 
ward Manhattan), Grasshopper Falls, Pawnee, and one or two others. Those from the Slave- 
labor States founded Kickapoo, Doniphan, Atchison, and a few others on or near the Missouri 
River A few days after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, hundreds of Ixissourians 
went over into Kansas, selected a tract of land, and put a mark upon it, for the purpose of 
establisliing a sort of pre-emiption right to it, and finally, at a public meeting, resolved as follows: 
— "That we will afford protection to no abolitionist as a settler of this Territory. That we 
recognize the institution of slavery as alruady existing in this Territory, and advise slare-holders 
to introduce their property as early as possible." 



52S THE NATION. [1855 

had v.o business there.' Xoav, these Missourians were more open in their usur- 
pation of the rights of the citizens of Kansas. While only eight hundred and 
thirty-one legal electors voted for members of the Legislature, there were no 
less than six thousand three hundred and tAventy votes polled. A thousand 
men came from Missouri, armed with deadly weapons, two cannon, tents, and 
other things that appear in time of war, and encamped around Lawrence.* 
These carried the election by the most shameful fraud and violence ; and in 
like manner such ruffians controlled every other poll in the Territory. Then a 
reign of terror commenced in Kansas, and actual civil war darkened that beau- 
tiful land for more than a year. All classes of men carried deadly weapons^ 
and a slight or accidental quarrel frequently produced unusual violence. 

The Legislature of Kansas, thus illegally chosen, M'as called by the Gov- 
ernor to meet at Pawnee City, on the Kansas River, nearly a hundred miles 
from the Missouri line. It immediately adjourned to Shawnee Mission, on the 
Missouri border, and there proceeded to enact the most barbarous laws for the 
upholding of slavery in the new Territory. These were regularly vetoed by 
the Governor, and as regularly passed over his veto. He was so of»noxious to 
the pro-slavery party, that they asked President Pierce to remove him. He 
did so, and sent ex-Governor Wilson Shannon, of Ohio-, to fill his place. That 
official Avas acceptable to the Missourians, for he declared that he was for slavery 
in Kansas, and that the Kansas Legislature was legal, and its laws Avere bind- 
ing on the people ! 

The actual settlers in Kansas, the larger portion of Avhom were from the 
Free-labor States, held a mass convention on the 5th of September [1855], 
when they resolved not to recognize the laws of the Legislature, fraudulently 
chosen, as binding upon them. They refused to vote for a delegate to Congress 
at an election appointed by that Legislature, and they called a delegate conven- 
tion at Topeka on the 19th of October. By that convention Governor Reeder 

1 A Democrat, named John "W. "Whitfield, was elected. He was an ofiBcer in the Confederate 
army during a portion of the late rebellion. David R. Atchison, then a member of the United 
States Senate from Missouri, was one of the chief promoters of the frauds and rufiBanism by 
which attempts were made to seize Kansas. He, too, was a leader in the rebellion. 

' This band of lawless men were led by Claiborne F. Jackson, who was elected Governor of 
Missouri by the Democrats in 1860. He took an active part in the rebellion against his Govern- 
ment, and died a refugee in Arkansas, in 1862. On the evening before the election we are con- 
sidering, his followers held a meeting at his tent, near Lawrence, and took measures to crush 
any attempt to have a legal polling of the votes. They threatened to hang an honest judge of 
the election, should he appear, and compelled another, under similar threats, to receive every voto 
oflFered by a Missourian. Some of these voted several times; and three of the men elected were 
residents of Missouri. Every man who did not sympathize with them, if known, was not allowed 
to vote. The result satisfied the slave-holders. The newspapers in their interest advised the 
Missourians who had thus "conquered Kansas" to "hold it, or die in the attempt;" and when 
Governor Reeder refused to give certificates to some of the men thus illegally elected, an(i 
drdered a new election on the 22d of May, to fill their place.s, he was threatened with death. " This 
infernal scoundrel," said a Missouri Tpuper {The Bruruwicker), "will have to be wiped out yet." 
No man was safe who dared to express his views in support of law and order. One example of 
the methods used by the slave-holders in conquering Kansas, cited by Mr. Greeley in his American 
Conflict (l 239), will suffice: — "William Phdlips, a Free-State lawyer of Leavenworth, saw fit to 
sign the protest against the wholesale frauds whereby the election at that place was carried. A 
few days thereafter, he was seized by a crowd of Missouri ruffians, taken by force to Weston, 
Missouri, eight miles distant, and there tarred and feathered, ridden oa a rail, and finally sold at 
auction to a negro, who was compelled to purchase hmi." 



1866.1 PIERCE'S ADMINISTRATION. 529 

Was nominated for delegate in place of Whitfield, and was elected by the 
legal votes of the Territory. On the 2.3d of the same month a convention of 
the same party, chosen by the settlers, assembled at Topeka and formed a con- 
stitution, which was approved by the legal votes of the Territory, whereby 
Kansas should become a Free-labor State, and under this they asked for the 
admission of their Territory into the Union as such. By this act a portion of 
the strife between freedom and slavery for supremacy in Kansas was now 
transferred to Washington City. There Reeder and Whitfield contested the 
claim of each to a seat. In the mean time elections had been held [January 
17, 1856] under the new State Constitution, and matters seemed dark for the 
pro-slavery party in that State, when President Pierce gave them comfort by 
sending in a special message to Congress [January 24], in which he represented 
the action of the legal citizens of Kansas in forming a State Constitution as 
rebellion ! 

All through the spring of 1856, violence and bloodshed prevailed in Kansas. 
Seeing the determination of the actual settlers to maintain their rights, ai*med 
men flocked into the Territory from the Slave-labor States, and, under pretext 
of compelling submission to the laws of the illegal Legislature, they roamed 
over the land, committing excesses of every kind.' Finally, Congress sent a 
committee of investigation^ to Kansas, whose majority made a report on the 
1st of July [1856], in which the political action of the legal voters of Kansas 
was fully vindicated, and the frauds by which the pro-slavery Legislature had 
been chosen, and Whitfield elected a delegate, had been fully exposed. The 
Missouri member of the committee dissented from the report, and the mission 
failed to produce positive action, to the great disappointment of the country.- 

As the autumn advanced, and the time for the election of a President of the 
Republic drew nigh, that question so absorbed public attention, that troubles 
in Kansas almost ceased. There were now three distinct political parties, and 
three candidates for the Chief Magistracy were before the people. A new and 
powerful party, composed chiefly of the opponents of the extension and exist- 
ence of slavery, had lately appeared. It was formed of men of every political 
creed, who were willing to cut loose from old organizations for the purpose of 
opposing the scheme of the slave-holders, and the leaders of the party of which 
President Pierce was the head, to make slavery a national instead of a sectional 
institution. This was called the Republican party. In the autumn of 1856, it 
had assumed vast proportions in the Free-labor States, and was kindly regarded 
by large numbers of patriotic men in the Slave-labor States. Tliere was another 
powerful political organization, known as the Aynericcai ox Know- Nothing party, 
whose proceedings were at first in secret. Its chief bond of union was opjDosition 
to foreign influence an^ the denunciation of Roman Catholicism in our political 

' A regiment of reckless young men, from South Carolina and Georgia, entered the Territory, 
under a man named Buford, in the spring of 1856, for the purpose, as they said, of making 
Kansas a Slave-labor State at aU hazards. These, with armed men under Atchison, Stringfellow, 
and other rufBans, traversed the Territory, executing their wicked wills at pleasure, without evea 
a rebuke from the Executive of the nation. 

* Composed of William A. Howard, of Michigan, John Sherman, of Ohio, and Mordecai Olivsn 
of MissourL 

34 



530 THE NATION. [1856. 

aiFairs. The Democratic party, dating its modern organization at the election 
of General Jackson, in 1828,' had been divided and weakened by the slavery 
question, for many wise men had left it when it became the avowed supporter 
of that institution, or had formed a new organization within its fold; while the 
old Wliig party^ was virtually annihilated as a distinct one. 

On the 22d of February, 1856, a national convention of the American party, 
held at Philadelphia, nominated ex-President Fillmore^ for -the office of Chief 
Magistrate, Avith A. J. Donelson, of Tennessee, for Vice-President. On the 
5th of June following, a national Democratic Convention* in Cincinnati nomi- 
nated for President of the Republic James Buchanan, of Pennsylvania, one of 
the authors of tlie " Ostend Circular,'" with John C. Breckenridge, of Ken- 
tucky, for Vice-President. This nomination was satisfactory to the Slave 
power, and the convention gave the coveters of Cuba and other territory 
within the Golden Circle*^ to understand that the party it represented was \v 
sympathy with their doctrines and schemes.' 

On the 17th of June [1856], a national convention of Republicans, assem- 
bled at Philadelphia, nominated John C. Fremont, of California,* for President, 
and William L. Dayton, of New Jersey, for Vice-President. That convention 
put forth strong resolutions, indicative of the creed of the new and powerful 
party it represented.^ An exciting canvass followed these several nominations, 
and the vote [November 4, 1856] resulted in the choice of James Buchanan. 
After this, nothing of great importance occurred during the remainder of Presi- 
dent Pierce's administi-ation, which expired on the 4th of March, 1857. 

» Page 459. ' Note 2, page 466. ' Note 5, page 501. 

* The two wings of the Democratic party (that leaning toward the anti-slavery policy of the 
Republicans being called the "Free-Soil Democracy") had been reconciled, and the organization 
was nearly a unit at this time. Delegates from each wing met in this convention, and they gen- 
erally agreed upou measures that were adopted. 

" Page 520. ' Note 3, page 520. 

'' In a series of resolutions, the convention took ground in favor of the efforts then making by 
JUibustavs, as the Spaniards call small bodies of invaders, in Central America, saying, in allusiom 
to Walker's outrages in Nicaragua : •' The people of the United States cannot but sympathize with 
the efforts which are being made-by the people of Central America to regenerate that portion of 
the continent which covers the passage across the inter-oceanic isthmus." They declared that 
the next administration would be expected to use every proper effort "to insure our ascendency 
in the Gulf of Mexico," and "Resolved, That the Democratic party are in favor of the acquisition 
of the Island of Cuba, on such terms as shall be lionorable to ourselves and just to Spain." A. 
G. Brown, Senator from Mississippi, who was one of a committee appointed to visit Buchanan at 
his home near Lancaster, and apprise him of his nomination, was so well satisfied that the 
nominee was in favor of tlie national policy of the slave-holders, that he wrote a cheerful letter to 
that effect [June 18, 1856] to S. R. Adams, which he closed by saying: "In my judgment, he is 
as worthy of Southern confidence and Southern votes as ever Mr. Calhoun was." Mr. Buchanaa 
did not disappoint his most sanguine "Southern" friends. 

" Page 488. 

® In tlie matter of aggression upon weak neighbors, the convention took direct issue with the 
Democratic party, by resolving, "That the highwayman's plea that 'might makes right,' embodied 
in the Ostend Circular, was in every respect unworthy of American diplomacy, and would bring 
shame and dishonor on any goverimient or people that gave it their sanction." 



1867.] 



BUCHANAN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



531 



•CHAPTER XV. 

BUCHANAN'S ADMINISTRATION. [1857—1861.] 

James Buchanan,' the fifteenth President of the Republic, took the oath 
of office at Washington City on the 4th of March, 1857. It was administered 
to him by the venerable Roger B. Taney, the Chief Justice of the United 




States. Among the spectators on that occasion was a citizen who bore a near 
relationship to the great Washington, and who had been present at the inaugu- 

' James Buchanan was born in Franklin County. Pennsylvania, on the 23d of April, 1791. 
He was educated at Dickenson College, where he was graduated at the age of eighteen years. I» 
1812 he was admitted to the bar, and was soon in successful practice in his native State. In 1814, 
when only twenty-three years of age, he was elected to a seat in the Legislature ot Pennsylvania. 
This was his first prominent appearance in public life. In 1815 he distinguished himself in his' 
FLate Legislature as an opponent of the United States Bank, and became one of the foremost mea 
in the Democratic party. He was elected to CJongress in 1820, and there he soon became distin- 
guished as a speaker and debater. After «en years' service, he retired from Congress in 1831. 
when President Jackson appointed him minister to Russia. In 1833 he was elected to the United 
States Senate, where he also served ten years. President Polk called him to his cabinet, as See- 
retary (tf State ; and in 1849 he again retired to private life. In 1853 he was appointed minister 
to EngUad ; and in June, 1856, he was nominated for President of the United States. In Noy-jw 



r532 THE NATION". [1867. 

ration of every Chief Magistrate of the Republic' Two days afterward, the 
Senate confirmed Mr. Buchanan's cabinet appointment.'^ 

The beginning of Buchanan's administration was marked by an event which 
greatly intensified the sectional strife concerning slavery. Dred Scott, a 
negro, had been held as a slave in Missouri until 1834, when his master, who 
was a surgeon in the army, being ordered to a post in Illinois, took him into 
that Free-labor State. There Scott married the slave girl of another ofiicer, 
with the consent of the masters. They had two children, born within Free- 
labor territory. The mother had been bought by the master of Scott, and 
when he returned to Missouri he held the parents and children in bondage. 
They were sold, and Scott finally sued for his freedom, on the ground of his 
involuntaiy residence for years in a Free-labor region. The State Circuit Court 
of St. Louis County, in which the case was tried, gave judgment in his favor. 
This was reversed by the Supreme Court of the State, and the question wa& 
carried to and heard by the Supreme Court of the United States, at Washing- 
ton, in May, 1854, Chief Justice Taney presiding. The decision was reserved, 
for alleged prudential reasons, until after the Presidential election, in the 
autumn of 1856.* That decision, uttered by the Chief Justice, was against 
Scott, the majority of the court agreeing with its he.ad in denying to any per- 
son, " whose ancestors were imported to this country and sold as slaves," any 
right to sue in a court of the United States ; in other words, denying the right 
of citizenship to any person who had been a slave, or was the descendant of a 
slave. 

The legitimate business of the court was simply a denial of jurisdiction ; 
but the Chief Justice took the occasion to give the sanction and aid of that 
august tribunal to the efforts of the slave-holders to nationalize the institution 
of slavery. With a strange disregard of popular intelligence, he asserted, in 
opposition to testimony to the contrary, found in abundance in our records of 
legislation and social life, that the framers and supporters of the Declaration 
of Independence did not include the black race in our country in the great 
proclamation that " all men are created equal ;" that our Revolutionary fathers 
and their progenitors, " for more than a century before," regarded the black 
race among us as " so far inferior, that they had no rights which the white man 
was hound to respect^'' and that they " were never thought or spoken of except 

ber following he was elected to that high office, and on the 4th of March, 1861, he again 
retired to private life at his seat, called "Wheatland," near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where 
he died June 1, 1868. 

' George Washington Parke Ciistis, the grandson of Mrs. Washington, the adopted son of the 
patriot, and the last surviving executor of his will. Mr. Custis died at Arlington House, near 
Washington City, in the autumn of 1857. 

" He appointed Lewis Cass. Secretary of State; Howell Cobb, Secretary of the Treasury; John 
B. Floyd, Secretary of War; Isaac Toucey, Secretary of the Navy; Jacob Thompson, Secretary 
of the Interior; Aaron V. Brown, Postmaster-General; and Jeremiah S. Black, Attorney- 
General. 

* The majority of the Judges of the Supreme Court at that time, whose sympathies were witli 
the slave-holders, decided that, on account of the excitement produced by the Nebraska bill and 
events in Kansas, it was best to postpone the decision. " It is quite probable," says the 
author of Tlie American Conflict, i. 252, "that the action of the court in the premises, if made 
public at the time originally intended [Term of 1855-6], would have reversed the issue of that 
Presidential election." 



as57.] BUCHANAN'S ADMINISTRATION. 533 

as property.'''' He further alleged that the framers of the Constitution " held the 
same views, as is equally evident from its provisions and language," when in 
that instrument slaves are always spoken of as " persons," and not as property, 
riavmg, with these and other statements, equally discordant with the facts of 
history, declared the colored people of our country incapable of being citizens, 
he proceeded to declare also that the Missouri Compromise Act, and all other 
acts of Congress restricting slavery, were unconstitutional, and that neither 
Congress, nor local Legislatures, had any authority for restricting the spread 
of the institution of slavery The majority of the court agreed with the Chief- 
Justice in these extra-judicial opinions, and the leaders of the dominant politi- 
cal party assumed that the nation was bound to acquiesce in the judgment of 
these five or six fallible men, who proposed to turn back the tide of civili- 
zation into the darker channels of a barbaric age from which it had broken, 
and was making the desert of humanity " blossom as the rose." The conscience 
of the nation refused acquiescence.' 

The newly elected President, who appears to have been informed of this 
decision before its promulgation, regarded it with great favor, and acted 
accordingly. In his inaugural address, delivered two days before the decision 
was promulgated, he hinted at the measure as one that would " speedily and 
finally " settle the slavery question.*^ " The whole Territorial question," he said, 
*' being thus settled upon the principle of popular sovereignty — a principle as 
ancient as free government itself — every thing of a practical nature has been 
decided," and he expressed a hope that the long agitation of the subject of 
slavery was " approaching its end." A council of pi'iests could not stop the 
motion of the earth, and Galileo knew it, and said so ; the opinions of a few 
men could not prevent the great heart of the nation beating with strong 
desires to have our Republic in fact, as in name — 

" The land of the free and the home of the brave." 

Kansas was still a battle-field on which Freedom and Slavery were openly 
contending. The energetic measures of John W. Geary, who had succeeded 
Shannon as governor of the Territory, had smothered the fires of civil war for 
a time. He was succeeded by Robert J. Walker, a Mississippian, who was 
Secretary of the Treasury under President Polk ; and Frederick P. Stanton, of . 
Tennessee, was appointed Secretary of the Territory. The two parties were 

' Roger Brooke Taney was born in Maryland, on the I7th of March, 17 IT, and was admitted 
to the bar as a practicing law3'er in 1799. He served, at an early age, in the Senate and Assembly 
of Maryland. He was appointed Attorney-General of the United States in 1831, and Secretary of 
the Treasury in 1833. He was appointed Chief Justice of the United States on the death of Judge 
Marshall, and took his seat as such in January, 1837. He remained in that ofBce until his death, ia 
the city of Washington, on the 12th of October, 1864, when his place was filled by Salmon P. 
Chase, of Ohio. 

'^ Discussing the right of the citizens of a Territory to settle the question whether or not 
slavery should exist in such Territory, he said: "It is a judicial question, which legitimately 
belongs to the Supreme Court of the United States, before whom it is now pending, and will, it is 
understood, be speedily and finally settled. To their decision, in common with all good citizens, 
I shall cheerfully submit." It should be remembered that the subject of discussion was never 
before the court for adjudication in any shape, and that the decision was an extra-judicial opinion 
of the Chief Justice, supported by some of his associates, and of no more binding force in law 
than the opinion of any other citizen. That opinion was promulgated on the 6th of March, 1857. 



534 THE NATION. [1858. 

•working energetically for the admission of Kansas as a State, with opposing 
ends in vicAV. The pro-slavery party, in convention at Lecorapton early in. 
September, 1857, formed a constitution, in which was a clause providing that 
" the rights of property in slaves now in the Territory shall in no manner be 
interfered with," and forbade any amendments of the instrument until 1864. 
It was submitted to a vote of the people on the 21st of December following, 
but, by the terms of the election law, no one might vote against that Consti- 
tution. The vote was taken • " For the Constitution, with slavery," or " For 
the Constitution, xoithout slavery ;" so that, in either case, a Constitution that 
protected and perpetuated slavery would be voted for. The vote for the Con- 
stitution with slavery was, of course, largely the majority. 

Meanwhile, an election for a Territorial Legislature was held. Assured by 
Walker that justice should rule, the friends of Free labor generally voted, and, 
notwithstanding enormous frauds,' they carried the Legislature and elected a 
delegate to Congress. The new Legislature, unquestionably legal, ordered the 
Lecompton Constitution to be submitted to the people of the Territory for 
their adoption or rejection. The result was its rejection by over ten thousand 
majority.^ Regardless of this strong expi'ession of the will of the people of 
Kansas, the President sent the pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution to Con- 
gress [February 2, 1858], wherein was a large Democratic majority, with a 
message in which he recommended its acceptance and ratification.^ It was 
accepted by the Senate (32 yeas, 25 nays), but in the House a substitute pro- 
posed by the venerable Senator Crittenden, of Kentucky, was adopted, which 
provided for the re-submission of the Lecompton Constitution to the people of 
Kansas. It was done, and that instrument was again rejected by about ten 
thousand majority. The political power in Kansas Avas noAV in the hands of 
the friends of freedom, and finally, at the close of January, 1861, that Territory- 
was admitted into the Union as a Free-labor State, and the thirty-fourth 
member of the family. So ended one of the most desperate of the skirmishes 
before the great battle between Freedom and Slaver}^, Avhich we shall consider 
presently. And in 1862, the opinion of Chief Justice Taney, that a descendant 
of a slave could not become a citizen of the Republic, was practically rejected 
as unsound, by the issuing of a passport to one, by the Secretary of State, to 
travel abroad as a " citizen of the United States." 

While the friends of freedom were anxiously considering how they should 
save their country from the perils with which the institution of slavery threat- 
ened it, the friends of that system, emboldened by the sympathy of the- 
government, formed plans for its perpetuity, and their own profit and aggran-^ 
dizement, which would practically disregard the plain requirements of the 

' One or two examples maybe given. In a little precinct on the Missouri border, where there 
'were but forty-three legal votes, 1,600 votes were taken : and at another place, where no poll waa 
opened, 1,200 were returned. 

" The vote was, for the Constitution with slavery. 138; for it without slavery, 24: against it^ 
10,226. 

' In that message he said, referring to the opinion of Chief Justice Taney, already considered: 
"It has been solemnly adjudged, by the highest judicial tribunal known to our laws, that slavery 
exists in Kansas by virtue of the Constitution of the United States. Kansas is, therefore, at 
this moment, as much a slave State as Georgia or South Carolina." 



1857.] 



BUCHANAN'S ADMINISTRATION, 



535 



N'ational Constitution, and defy the laws f)f tlie land and tlie Iraaiane spirit of 
the time. Tlioy resolved to re-open the Afi-ican slave-trade. In direct viola- 
tion of the laws, native Africans were landed on the coasts of the Soiathern 
States, and placed in hopeless bondage. In Louisiana, leading citizens engaged 
in a scheme for legalizing that horrid traffic, under the deceptive guise of what 
they called the "African Labor-supply Association,'" and in Savannah, Georgia, 
a grand jurj^, who were compelled by law to find several bills against persons 
charged with complicity in the slave-trade, actually protested against the laAvs 
they were sworn to support.* Southern newspapers openly advocated the 
traffic f and a prominent Southern clergyman asserted his conviction that the 
horrible African slave-trade was "the most worthy of all missionary societies."* 
Southern legislatures and conventions 
openly discussed the subject of re-opening 
the trade.* John Slidell, of Louisiana, 
one of the fomenters of hatred of the 
Union, urged in the Senate of the United 
States the propriety of Avithdrawing Ameri- 
can cruisers from the coast of Africa, that 
the traffickers in human beings might not be 
molested; and the administration of Mr. 
Buchanan was made to favor this scheme 
of the great cotton-planters, by protest- 
ing against the visitation of suspected 
slave-bearing vessels, carrying the American 
flag, by British cruisers.* 

The Fugitive Slave Act was now bear- 




JOHN SLIDELL. 



' The President of that association was the late Mr. De Bow, editor of De Bmo's Review, pub- 
lished in New Orleans. That magazine was the acknowledged organ of tlie oligarchy of slave- 
holders, and was one of the chief promoters of the late rebellion. 

' "We feel humbled," they said, "as men. in the consciousness that we are freemen but Im 
name, and that we are living, during the existence of such laws, under a tj^raany as supreme a3 
that of the despotic governments of the Old World. Heretofore the people of the South, firm in 
their consciousness of right and strength, have failed to place the stamp of condemnation upon 
such laws as reflect upon the institution of slavery, but have permitted, unrebuked, tiie influence 
of foreign opinion to prevail in their support." 

^ The True Southron, published in Mississippi, suggested the "propriety of stimulating th© 
zeal of the pulpit by founding a prize for the best sermon in favor of free-trade in negroes^ This 
proposition was widely copied with approval, and in many pulpits professed ministers of the 
gospel exhibited "zeal" in the service of the slave power, without the stimulus of an offered prize. 

* Doctor James H. Tliornwell, President of the Presbyterian Theological Seminary at Columbia, 
South Carolina. Dr. Thornwell, who died at the beginning of the late rebellion, was distinguished 
as "the Calhoun of the Church" in the South. 

^ The "Southern Commercial Convention," held at Yicksburg, Mississippi, on the 11th of 
May, 1859, resolved, by a vote of 47 to 16, that "all laws. State or Federal, prohibiting tho 
African slave-trade, ought to be abolished." There is ample evidence on record, that Jefferson 
Davis, Alexander H. Stephens, William L. Yancey, and other leaders in the late rebellion, were 
advocates of the foreign slave-trade. 

^ By an arrangement between the governmenljf of the United States and Great Britain, tlie 
cruisers of each were empowered to board vessels of either nation suspected of being engaged 
in the African slave-trade. When, in the summer of 1858, it was known tliat the trade 
was about to be carried on actively by men of the Slave-labor States, the British cruisers 
in the Gulf of Mexico were unusually vigilant, and in the course of a few weeks boarded 
about forty suspected American vessels. Our government, inspired by men like Slidell, protested 



586 THE NATIOX [1857. 

ing the fruit desired by its author.' The evident intention oi the slave-hoklers, 
assisted by the President and the Chief Justice, to nationalize slavery, increased 
the sense of its ofFensiveness ; and the denial of the obvious meaning of the 
vital doctrine of the Declaration of Independence awakened in the breast of 
the people, especially in the Free-labor States, strong desires for removing 
from the national escutcheon the horrid stain of human bondage.' The Legis- 
latures of several Free-labor States adopted measures to prevent, by lawful 
means, its most injurious actions, and in a special manner to prevent the 
carrying away of free persons of color into slavery, the law denying the right 
of the alleged fugitive to trial by jury. The Legislature of New York re- 
affirmed the determination of the State authorities to make every slave free 
that should be brought involuntarily within its borders, and denounced the 
opinion of the Chief Justice, which denied citizenship to men of color. Ohio 
passed a bill of similar character; and Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, 
Michigan, and Wisconsin took strong ground in favor of the freedom of the 
slave, without assuming an attitude of actual resistance to the obnoxious Act, 
which all were bound to obey so long as it remained unrepealed. These " Per- 
sonal Liberty Laws," as they were called, exasperated the slave-holders, and 
they were used by the politicians as a pretext, as it was intended they should be, 
for kindling the flames of civil war. At about the same time a " National 
Emancipation Society" was formed at Cleveland, Ohio [August 26, ISST] 
having for its object the maturing of a plan for ending slavery by the purchase 
of the slaves by the National government. 

against what it was pleased to call the odious British doctrine of "the right of search," and the 
British government, for "prudential reasons," put a stop to it, and laid the blame on the ofiBcers 
of tJie cruisers. 

' See page 521. 

* When the Declaration of Independence was promulgated, its precepts struck at the root of 
human bondage in every form; and eflbrts were made, in several States, to eradicate the institu- 
tion, sometimes in the form of propositions for immediate, and at others for gradual, emancipation. 
It had been expehed from England by the decision of Lord Mansfield, just before the kindling of 
the American Kevolutiou. This decision was in the case of James Somerset, a native of Africa, 
who was carried to Tirginia, and sold as a slave, taken to England by his master, and there 
induced to assert his freedom. The first case of a similar nature on record in England was in 
1697, when it was held that negroes "being usually bought and sold among merchants, as mer- 
chandise, and also being infidels, there might be a property in them sufficient to maintain trover." 
This position was overruled by Chief Justice Holt, who decided that "so soon as a negro lands in 
England, he is free." To this decision Cowper alludes, when he says, "Slaves cannot breathe in 
England." In 1702, Justice Holt also decided that "there is no such thing as a slave bj' the law 
of England." In 1729, an opinion was obtained, that "negroes legally enslaved elsewhere might 
be held as slaves in England, and that baptism was no bar to the master's claim." This was 
held as good law imtil Mansfield's decision above mentioned. 

In the Enghsh colonies in America, the most enlightened men, regarding slavery with great 
disfavor, made attempts from time to time to limit or to eradicate it. The utterances and actions of 
George Washington, Henry Laurens, Thomas Jefferson, and other slave-holders, and of Dr. 
Eranklin, John Jay, and many other leading patriots, directly refute the assertion of Judge Taney, 
that in their time Africans by descent "were never thought or spoken of except as property." 
Among the important public acts of those men so misrepresented, was the famous Ordinance of 
1787 [see page 362], adopted before the IsTational Constitution was framed, which was the final 
result of an effort commenced in the Contine|>tal Congress some years before [1784] to restrict 
slavery. That action was in relation to a plan for the government of the Western Territory, then 
indudmg the whole region west of the old thirteen States, as far south as the thirty-first degree 
of north latitude, and embracing several of the late Slave-labor States. The plan was submitted 
by a committee, of wliich Thomas Jefferson was chairman. It contemplated the ultimate division 
of that territory into seventeen States, eight of them below the latitude of the present city of 



1859.] BUCHANAN'S ADMINISTRATION. 537 

The attention vi' tlie public miud was somewhat diverted for a while from 
the absorbing topic of slavery by the movements of the Mormons in Utah/ 
early in 1857. Incensed because their Territory was not admitted as a State, 
they commenced revolutionary proceedings. They destroyed the records of 
the United Spates Court for the District ; and under the instructions of their 
Governor and spiritual head, Brigham Young,* they looked to him for alllawr. 
The President determined to enforce those of the United States, He appointed 
Colonel Cumming Governor of Utah, and sent an army to uphold his authority. 
Young issued a proclamation, declaring his intention to resist the troops ; but 
when Cumming arrived there, in April, 1858, while the army was at Fort 
Bridger, Young received him with courtesy, and surrendered to him the Seal 
of the Territory ; at the same time he and his people prepared to leave the 
country, declaring that they would emigrate to a new land rather than submit 
to military and Gentile rule. The troops, who had lost a provision train, 
■destroyed by the Mormons, were recalled ; the " Mormon War " ended, and 
Young and his people were soon again applying for the admission of their 
Territory as a State." They are yet [1883] unsuccessful. Polygamy is the 
hindrance. Measures have been taken by Congress to remove the evil. 

The autumn of 1859 was the witness of a most extraordinary excitement 
on the subject of slavery. The feverishness in the public mind, produced by 
the discussions of that topic, had somewhat subsided, and there was unusual 
calmness in the political atmosphere. Utah was quiet ; difficulties which had 
arisen between our government and that of Paraguay, in South America, had 
been settled, and the Indian troubles on the Pacific coast were drawing to a 
close.* "Walker's fillibustering operations against Nicaragua were losing much 
of their interest in consequence of his failures,' and the National Legislature, 
during its short session, had been much engaged in action upon the Pacific 
Railway, Homestead, Soldiers' Pension, and other bills of national interest. 
The summer had passed away in general quietude throughout the country, 
and the weary in the political field were hoping for rest, when the whole na- 
tion was startled, as by a terrific th under- jjeal, by an announcement from Balti- 



LouisviUe, in Kentucky. Among the rules for the government of that region, reported by Mr. 
Jefferson, was the following: " That after the year 1800 of the Christian era, there shall be neither 
slavery nor involuntary servitude in any of the said States, otherwise than in punishment of crimes, 
whereof the party shall have been convicted to be personally guilty." This clause was stricken 
out [April 19,. 1784], on motion of Mr. Spaight, of North Carolina, seconded by Mr. Read, of South 
Carolina. A majorit}^ of the States were against striking it out, but the Articles of Confederation 
required a vote of nine States to carry a proposition. See Journals of Congress. In the Ordinance 
of 1787 [see page 362], this rule, omitting the words, ''after the year 1800 of the Christian era," 
was incorporated. 

' See page 504. 

^ The successor of Joseph Smith [page 504], who was duly appointed Governor of Utah by 
President Fillmore in 1850. 

* Early in 18G2 they formed a new State Constitution, elected senators and representatives 
under it, and applied for admission when Congress assembled, near the close of the year. No 
action was had on the application: but Congress passed a law ''to punish and prevent the prac- 
tice of polygamy in the Territories of the United States." and in other places, and disapproving 
and annulling certain acts of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Utah. The law 
against polygamy has been a dead letter in our statute-books. 

* Page 525. ' Page 525. 



538 I'HE NATIOX. [1859-. 

more [October 17, 1859] that "an insurrection hatJ broken out a'. Ilai-per'a 
Ferry,' where an armed band of Abolitionists have full possession of the Gov- 
ernment Arsenal." This was the celebrated " John Brown's Rai<^," which, 
kindled a blaze of intense excitement throughout the Slave-labor States, and 
revived the " slavery agitation " Avith fiercest intensity. 

The outline of the story of " John Brown's Raid " may be given in few 
words. Brown* had acted and suffered much in Kansas during the civil war 
there, where he was a prominent anti-slavery man. He was enthusiastic, fanat- 
ical, and brave, arid believed himself to be the destined liberator of the slaves 
in our land. He went into Canada from Kansas by way of Detroit, Avith a 
few followers and twelve slaves from Missouri, whom he led to freedom in the 
dominions of the British Queen. At Chatham he held a convention [May 8^ 
1859], whereat a " Provisional Constitution and Ordinances for the People of 
the United States " was adopted, not, as the instrument itself declared, for the 
overthrow of any government, " but simply to amend and repeal ;" adding, 
" and our flag shall be the same that our fathers fought under in the Revolu- 
tion." It was part of a scheme for an uprising of the slaves for the obtaining 
of their freedom. 

The summer of 1859 was spent in preparations for a decisive movement^ 
and Brown finally hired a farm a few miles from Harper's Ferry, where he was 
known by the name of Smith. There a few followers stealthily congregated, 
and pikes and other weapons were gathered, and ammunition was provided, 
for the purpose of striking the first blow against slavery in Virginia. The 
appointed time for delivering that blow was Sunday evening, the 16th of 
October, when Brown, moving in profound darkness, with seventeen white and 
five colored men, entered the little village of Harper's Ferry, extinguished the 
public lights, seized the armory and the railway bridge, and quietly arrested 
and imprisoned in the government buildings citizens as they appeared in the 
streets, one by one, in the morning, ignorant of what had happened. The 
news soon went abroad. Virginia militia flocked to the rescue, and in the 
course of twenty-four hours Colonel Robert E. Lee was there with government 
troops and cannon. Struggles between the raiders and the militia and citizens 
resulted in several deaths. Two of Brown's sons were killed, and the leader 
was captured. He expected a general uprising of the negroes in that region, 
but was disappointed. He was indicted for exciting slaves to insurrection, 

' At the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers, in Virginia, where the united 
streams burst througli the Blue Ridge. There was a National armory, in which a large quantity 
of arms were stored at the time we are considering. 

^ John Brown was born in Farmington, Connecticut, on the 9tli of May, 1800. When he 
was five years of age liis family settled in Hudson, Ohio, and, as a cattle-driving boy, he was at 
the surrender of Hull at Detroit, iu 1812. His school education was meager, and he learned the 
trade of tanner and currier. He commenced studying for the ministr}-, but weak eyes compelled 
him to desist. He worked at his trade and farming in both Ohio and Pennsylvania. He engaged 
extensively in wool dealing, and on account of that business went to Europe, incurring heavy 
loss, and returning a bankrupt. He moved from place to place, and finally went to Kansas with 
sons by his first wife, where he was active in public matters. He became an abolitionist in early 
life, and the conviction that he was to be a liberator of the slaves possessed him so early as 1839. 
He was twice married, and had seven children by his fii-st wii'c and thirteen by his last wife,, 
who yet [1883] survives him. 



1859.] BUCHANAN'S ADMINISTRATION. 53() 

and for treason and murder. He was tried and found guilty [October 29], and 
was executed on the 2d of December, under the laAvs of Virginia. 

The most exaggerated reports concerning this raid went abroad. Terror 
spread over Virginia. Its Governor (Henry A. "Wise) was almost crazy with 
excitement, and incurred the pity and ridicule of the whole country.' Through- 
out the Slave-labor States there wa,s a wide-spread apprehension of slave insur- 
rections, and every man there from the Free-labor States was suspected of 
being an emissary of the abolitionists. Attempts were made to implicate 
leaders of the Republican party, and the inhabitants of the Free-labor 
States generally, in this scheme for liberating the slaves. The author of the 
Fugitive Slave law, James M. Mason,^ was chairman of a committee of the 
United States Senate appointed to investigate the matter; and Clement L. 
Vallandigham, of Ohio, then a member of the Lower House, volunteered to 
aid in proving the charge against the people of the North. The result was 
positive proof that Brown had no accomplices, and only about twenty follow- 
ers. Although Brown's mad attempt to free the slaves was a total failure in 
itself, it proved to be one of the important events which speedily brought 
abotit the result he so much desired. 

The elections in 1858 and 1859 indicated a remarkable and growing strength 
in the Republican party, and it was evident to the slave-holders that their dom- 
ination in the councils of the nation would speedily end. They saw no chance 
for the election of another President of their choice, and some leaders of that 
powerful oligarchy, who had been for years anxious for the overthrow of 
the Republic by a dissolution of the Union, so as to establish the great sla-ve 
empire of their dreams within the Golden Circle,'' perceived that they must 
sti-ike the blow during or at the immediate close of Mr. Buchanan's adminis- 
tration, or perhaps never. They must have a pretext for the crime, and they 
set diligently to work to create one more specious than the opposition, to the 
Fugitive Slave law would afford. They were in full political alliance with the 



' The excited Governor was prepared, according to his own words, to make war upon aU the 
Free-labor States, for the honor of Virginia. In a letter to the President [Nov. 25, 1859], after 
saying that he had good authority for the belief that a conspiracy to rescue John Brown existed 
in Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, and other States, he said: — I protest that my purpose is 
peaceful, and that I disclaim all threats when I say, with all the might of meaning, that if another 
invasion assails this State or its citizens from any quarter, I will pursue the invaders wherever 
they may go, into any territory, and punish them wherever arms can reach them. I shall send a 
copy of this to the Governors of Maryland, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. — Autograph Letter. Before 
the close of the late civil war, of which Wise was one of the fomenters, a daughter of John 
Brown was a teacher of a school of colored children in the ex-Governor's house, near Norfolk, 
Yirginia, then in possession of the government. 

Wise was willing to find victims to "punish" by secret and dishonorable means. In a let- 
ter to the President, written twelve days before [November 1 3] the one above cited, he asked 
the Executive and the Postmaster-General to aid him in a scheme for seizing and taking to Vir- 
ginia Frederick Douglas, an eminent and widely-known colored citizen, who had escaped from 
slavery many years before, and was then living in the western part of the State of New York, 
though Wise, as appears by the letter, supposed him to be in Michigan. Douglas was an elo- 
quent and influential pleader for the emancipation of his race, and was feared and intensely hated 
by the slave-holders. He was guilty of no crime — no act that a slave-holder could complain of 
but escape from bondage. That was a crime quite sufficient for the crazy Governor of Virginia 
to have justified himself in hanging Douglas on the same gaUows with John Brown. 

" Page 521. . » Page 520. 



540 



THE NATIOX 



[1860. 



Democratic party then in power, and might, by acting with it in good faith, 
and electing a President of its choice in 1860, maintain its possession of the 
government for some time longer, but with no certainty of a lasting tenure, 
for a large faction of that party, under the leadership of Senator Douglas, 
showed tangible proclivities toward affiliation with the opponents of slavery. 
So the leaders of the oligarchy resolved to destroy the supremacy of that 
party, and -allow the Republicans to elect their candidate, whoever he might 
be, and thus, with the pretext that he was a sectional President, and an enemy 
to the institution of slavery, they might, with plausible appeals to the domi- 
nating passions of their class, " fire the Southern heart," and make a success- 
ful revolution possible. This was a plan formed by disunionists like Jeffer- 
son Davis, of Mississippi ; John Slidell and Judali P. Benjamin, of Louisi- 
ana ; William L. Yancey, of Alabama ; Eobert Toombs and Howell Cobb, 
of Georgia ; the Rhetts, W. P. Miles, and L. M. Keitt, of South Carolina ; 
T. Clingman, of North Carolina ; D. L. Yulee, of Florida ; Louis T. Wigfall, 
of Texas ; and James M. Mason and R. M. T. Hunter, of Virginia, who ap- 
peared most prominently as actors at the opening of the late Civil War. 
These men, as the ordeal to which their actions soon exposed them proved, 
were lacking in the true elements which constitute statesmen, but had for 
years assumed the character of such. They were acknowledged leaders of 
opinion and action in the more southern Slave-labor States, to the mortal 
hurt of the Southern people. 

Almost six hundred chosen representatives of the Democratic party assem- 
bled in convention in the hall of the South Carolina Institute, in Charleston, 

South Carolina, on the 




of April, 1860, for 
purpose . of nomi- 



23d 
the 

nating candidates for the 
Presidency and Vice- 
Presidency of the Repub- 
lic. It was evident from 
the first hour of the ses- 
sion that the spirit of the 
slave system was there, 
full of mischief, and as 
potential as Ariel in the 
creation of elementary 
strife. For months there 
had been premonitions of 
a storm which might topple from its foundations the organization known as 
the Democratic party. Violent discordant elements were now in close con- 
tact, and all felt that a fierce tempest was impending. 

Caleb Cushing, of Massachusetts, was chosen the Chairman of the Conven- 
tion. The choice was in accordance with the wishes of the slave-holders. In 
his inaugural speech Mr. Cusliing declai-ed it to be the " high and noble part 
of the Democratic party of the Union to withstand — to strike down and con- 



SOUTH CAROLINA INSTITUTE. 



I860.] BUCHANAN'S ADMINISTRATION. 54;J. 

qner " the " banded enemies of the Constitution," as lie styled the anti-slavery 
Republican j^arty. But those in the Convention most clamorous for the Con- 
stitution wei-e not anxious, at that time, to " strike down " the Republican 
party. They were more intent upon striking down their own great party, for 
the moment, by dividing it ; and a greater portion of the delegates from the 
Slave-labor States came instructed, and were resolved to demand fi-om the 
Convention a candidate and a platform which should promise a guaranty for 
the speedy practical recognition, by the general government and the people, 
of the system of slavery as a national institution. Senator Stephen A. Doug- 
las,' of Illinois, was the most prominent candidate of the party for a nomina- 
tion before the Convention. It was well knoAvn that he was committed to a 
course that would not allow him or his friends to agree to such a platform of 
principles. His rejection by the representatives of the slave-holders would 
split the Democratic party asunder, and then the first great and desired act iu 
the drama of rebellion against their government would be auspiciously begun. 
They resolved to employ that wedge. 

The Democratic party throughout the Union had accepted the doctrine of 
" Popular Sovereignty," of which Douglas was the sponsor and exponent, and 
which was put forth in the resolutions of the Convention at Cincinnati that 
nominated Buchanan,^ as the true solution of the slavery question ; but now it 
was rejected by the slave-holders as too dangerous to their interests. Their 
experience in Kansas taught them that positive law, and not public opinion, 
must thereafter be relied on for the support of slavery. So when the Conven- 
tion, by a handsome majority, reaffirmed the Cicinnati platform of principles — • 
adopted the " Douglas platform " of Popular Sovereignty — preconcerted rebel- 
lion lifted its head defiantly. Le Roy P. Walkex-, who was Jefferson Davis's 
so-called " Secretary of War " at the beginning of the late rebellion, declared 
that he and his associates from Alabama were instructed not to acquiesce in or 
submit to any such platform, and, in the event of such being adopted, to with- 
draw from the Convention. That contingency had now occurred, and the 
Alabama delegates formally withdrcAv. 

This action of the Alabamians was imitated by delegates from other States. 
They were followed out of the Convention by all the delegates from Missis- 
sippi, all but two from Louisiana, all from Florida and Texas, three from 
Arkansas, and all but two from South Carolina. On the following day twenty- 
six of the thirty-four delegates from Georgia withdrew. Two delegates from 
Delaware followed, and joined the seceders ; and all met that night in St. 
Andrew's Hall, to prepare for a new organization. The disruption of the 
Democratic party represented in the Convention w^as now complete, and the 
disloyal intentions of the seceders were foreshadowed by Glenn, of Missis- 
sippi, one of their number, who said to the Convention, before leaving it : 
" I tell Southern men here, and for them I tell the North, that in less than sixty 
days you will find a united South standing side by side with us." He was 
vehemently cheered, especially by the South Carolinians, and Charleston was 

» Page 518. « Page 530. 



g^2 TOE NATION. [18Gv 

the scene of great delight that night, because of this auspicious beginning of a 
rebellion by the leaders of the oligarchy of slave-holders. 

The seceders, with James A, Bayard, of Delaware, as their chosen head, 
assembled the next day, organized what they called a " Constitutional Con- 
vention," sneeringly called the majoi-ity they had deserted a " Rum^D Conven- 
tion," and prej^ared for vigorous action. On the evening of the 3d of May, 
they adjourned to meet in Kichmond, Virginia, in June, and invited the 
*' Democracy " who sympathized with them to join them there. The original 
Convention adjourned to meet in Baltimore, Maryland, in June, to which time 
the nomination of a candidate was postponed. The latter reassembled in the 
Front Street Theater, in that city [June 18, 1860], with Mr. Cushing in the 
chair. There was a stirring time again, the subject of slavery being the 
exciting cause, and Cushing and most of the Massachusetts delegation with- 
drew.* The seceders, who had met at Richmond, were now in Baltimore, and 
these and the Cushing malcontents organized a Convention in the Maryland 
Institute. The regular Convention chose David Tod, of Ohio, for their presi- 
dent, and proceeded to nominate Mr. Douglas for the Chief Magistracy.' The 
seceders, calling themselves the National Democratic Convention^ nominated 
John C. Breckenridge, then Vice-President of the Republic, for President. 

On the 9th of May [1860], representatives of a party then about six months 
of age assembled in convention in Baltimore, styled themselves the National 
Constitutional Union Party, and was presided over by the late Washington 
Hunt. They nominated for President John Bell, of Tennessee,^ and for Vice- 
President, Edward Everett, of Massachusetts. They adopted as their platform 
the National Constitution, with the motto, The Union, the Constitution, 
AND THE Enforcement op the Laws. A few days later, chosen representa- 
tives of the Republican party, and a vast concourse of people, assembled [May 
16, 1860] in an immense building in Chicago, erected for the purpose, and 
called a " wigwam," to nominate a candidate for the Presidency. George 
Ashmun, of Massachusetts, presided. The Convention adopted a platform of 
principles in the foi-m of seventeen resolutions,'' and on the 19th nominated 

' Benjamin F. Butler, one of the Massachusetts seceders from the Convention in Baltimore, 
said before leaving it : " "We put our withdrawal before you upon the simple ground, among 
others, that there had been a withdrawal, in part, of a majority of the States; and, further (and 
that, perhaps, more personal to myself), upon the ground that I will not sit in a convention where 
the African slave-trade — which is piracy, by the laws of my country — is approvingly advocated." 

^ James Fitzpatrick, of Alabama, was nominated for Vice-President. He declined, and 
Herschel Y. Johnson, of Georgia, was substituted. 

^ When the Rebellion broke out, in the spring of 1861, Mr. BeU was one of the eariiest, if not 
the very first, of the professed Unionists of distinction who joined the enemies of his country, iu 
their attempt to overthrow the Constitution, and destroy the nationality of the Republic. Breck- 
enridge, the candidate of the pro-slavery wing of the Democra^tic party, became a major-general 
in the Confederate army and fought against the life of the Republic. 

* After affirming that the maintenance of tlie principles promulgated in the Declaration of 
Independence, and embodied in the National Constitution, is essential to the preservation of our 
Republican institutions ; congratulating the country that no Republican member of Congress had 
uttered or countenanced any threats of disunion, " so often made by Democratic members without 
rebuke, and with applause "from their political associates," and denouncing such threats as "an 
avowal of contemplated treason," the resolutions made explicit declarations upon the topic of 
slavery, so largely occupying public attention. In a few paragraphs, they declared that each 
State had the absolute right of control in the management of its own domestic concerns; that tlie 



I860.] 



BUCHANAN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



543 



Abraham Lincoln,' of Illinois, for the Presidency, and Hannibal Hamlin, of 
Maine, for the Vice-Presidency of the Republic. There, in that " wigwam," 
war was openly declared against the principles and purposes of the oligarchy 
of the Slave-labor States, and the standard of revolt was raised against the 
operations of a tyranny which was rapidly enslaving the nation, materially 




THE " WIGWAM " AT CHICAGO. 

and morally. In that " wigwam " Abraham Lincoln was made the standard- 
"bearer in that revolt which resulted in the overthrow of slavery, and the puri- 
fication and strengthening of the nation. 

And now, in the early summer-time of 1860, the most important political 
campaign known in this country was opened with four parties in the field, but 
only two of them (the Republican^ and the pro-slavery wing of the Democratic 



new doErma, that the Constitution, of its own force, carries slavery into any or all of the Terri- 
tories of the United States, was a dangerous political heresy, revolutionary in its tendency, and 
subversive of the peace and harmony of the country ; that the normal condition of all the territory 
■of the United States is that of freedom, and that neither Congress nor a Territorial Legislature, 
nor any individuals, have authority to give legal existence to slavery in any Territory of the 
United States, and that the reopening of the African slave-trade, then recently commenced in the 
Southern States, under the cover of our national flag, aided by perversions of judicial power, was 
a crime against humanity, and a burning shame to our country and age. 

' Abraham Lincoln was born in Hardin County, Kentucky, February 12, 1809. His ancestors 
were Quakers in Pennsylvania. When he was seven years of age, his father settled, with his 
family, in Indiana. He received but little education. He worked hard for ten years on a farm, 
and, at tlie age of nineteen years, went to New Orleans as a hired hand on a flat-boat. In 1830 
he settled in Illinois, became a clerk in a store, and was a captain of volunteers in the Black 
Hawk war, in 18o2. He was elected to the lUinois Legislature in 1834, in which he served 
four years. He was licensed in 1836 to practice law, and commenced the profession in Spring- 
field in 18:57. He rose to distinction. He was elected to Congress in 1846. He was named for 
the position in which Fremont was placed by the Ropubhcans in 1856 [page 530]. He was 
always an anti-slavery man, but did not rank with "Abolitionists." In November, 1860, he was 
elected President of the United States, and performed the duties of his office with singular fidelity, 
zeal, and wisdom, during the terrible Civil War that ensued. He was re-elected President in 
1864, and was inaugurated for his second term on the 4th of March, 1865. On the evening of the 
14th of April ne.xt ensuing he was shot by an assassin, and expired early the following morning, 
at the age of little more than fifty-six years. His remains repose in a vaiilt in the Oak Ridge 
"Cemetery, at Springfield, Illinois. 



5^^ THE NATION. [1860 

party) exhibiting tangible convictions, as units, on the great topic which had 
so long agitated the nation,^ and these took issue, squarely, definitely, and 
defiantly. It had been declared by the former, Avhose standard-bearer was 
Abraham Lincoln, that there was " an irrepressible conflict between Freedom 
and Slavery," — " that the Republic cannot exist half slave and half free," and 
that " freedom is the normal condition of all territory." It had been declared 
by the latter, whose standard-bearer was John C. Breckenridge, that no power 
existed that might lawfully control slavery in the Territories ; that it existed 
in any Territory in full force, whenever a slave-holder and his slaves entered 
it ; and that it was the duty of the National government to protect them. 
This was the issue. The conflict during the canvass, from July to November, 
was severe. The chief opponents and enemies of the Republic were with the 
Breckenridge faction, and they and their followers used every means in their 
power to excite the slave-holders, and the masses of the people in the Slave- 
labor States, against those of the Free-labor States. During the summer and 
autumn of 1860, they traversed the latter States, everywhere vindicating the 
claims put forth by the extremists of the pro-slavery party. Among these 
orators, in the interest of the oligarchy, William L. Yancey, a leading politi- 
cian of Alabama, was the most conspicuous. He was treated kindly, and 
listened to patiently. Then he went back to his State, and by misrepresenta- 
tions of the temper of the citizens of the North, and with the zeal of an ear- 
nest man regardless of consequences, he aroused into rebellion the confid- 
ing people he was about to betray. Like an incarnation of discord, he cried 
substantially as he had written two years before:^ — "^Organize committee^ 
all over the Cotton States ; fire the Southern heart ; instruct the Southern 
mind ; give courage to each other ; and at the proper moment, by one organ- 
ized, concerted action, precipitate the Cotton States into revolution." 

Yancey, in principles and action, was a type of politicians in the other 
Slave-labor States who now worked in co-operation with him in bringing about 
a rebellion against the government, by the slave-holders. Their pretext was 
found in the doctrines and practices of the Republican party, as revealed in their 
convention, during the canvass, and at the election [November 6, 1860], which 
resulted in the choice of Abraham Lincoln for President.* Although Mr. Lin- 
coln had a large majority over each candidate, and was elected in accordance 
with the letter and spirit of the National Constitution, yet the fact that hfr 
received 979,163 votes less than did all of his opponents, gave factitious vigor to 



^ The wing of the Democratic party led by Mr. Douglas, in its platform, assumed not to know 
positively whether slavery might or might not have a lawful existence in the Territories, without 
the action of the inhabitants thereof but expressed a willingness to abide by the decisions of the 
Supreme Court in all cases. The National Constitutional Union party, led by John Bell, declined • 
to express any opinion upon any subject. 

^ In a letter to James Slaughter, June 15, 1858. 

^ The electoral cohege [see Article XII. of the Amendments to the Constitution] then chosen 
was composed of 303 members. Mr. Lincoln received ISO votes, or 57 more than all of his oppo- 
nents. Bell received 39; Douglas, 12; and Breckenridge, 72. Of the popular vote, Lincoln 
received 491,295 over Douglas, 1,018,499 over Breckenridge, and 1.275.871 over Bell. The votes 
for the four candidates were, respectively: For Lincoln. 1,86(;,452; for Bell, 590,631 : for Douglas, 
1.375,141 ; and for Breckenridge, 847,953. A fair analysis of this popular vote shows that of the 
4,690,180 ballots cast, at least 3,500,000, or three-fourths of the whole, were given by men-, 
opposed to the further extension of the institution of slavery. 



I860.] Buchanan's administration. 545 

the plausible cry, which was immediately raised by the disloyalists and their 
friends, that the President-elect would be a usurper when in office, because he 
had not received a majority of the aggregate vote of the people ; and that his 
antecedents, the principles of the Republican platform, and the fanaticism of 
his supporters, pledged him to wage relentless war upon the system of slavery 
and the rights of the Slave-labor States.' 

When it was known that Mr. Lincoln was chosen for the Presidency, there 
was great rejoicing among the politicians in the Slave-labor States. It was 
the pre-concerted signal for open rebellion. Making that choice and its alleged 
menaces a pretext, the disloyalists and the politicians in their service at once 
adopted measures for precipitating ^'the cotton States into revolution."^ A 
system of terrorism was organized and put in vigorous operation, to crush 
out all active loyalty to the government. In it social ostracism and threats of 
personal injury and of the confiscation of property were prominent features 
in the region below North Carolina ; and the promise of Senator Clingman, 
of the latter State, that Union men should be hushed by " the swift atteution 
of vigilance committees," was speedily fulfilled. In this work the Press and 
Pulpit became powerful auxiliaries, and thousands upon thousands of men 
and women, regarding these as oracles of truth and wisdom, followed them 
reverentially in the broad highway of open opposition to their government. 
'' Perhaps there never Avas a peojile," wrote a resident of a Slave-labor State 
in the third year of tlie Avar, "more bewitched, beguiled, and befooled, than 
Ave Avere when we drifted into this rebellion." 

The disunionists, who had been colleagues or were disciples of John 0. 
Callioun,' and had been for years plotting treason against their government, 
now organized rebellion. They were of one mind in regard to the overt act ; 
they differed somcAvhat as to time and manner. Those of South Carolina, who, 
by common opinion, were expected to lead in the great movement, Avere anxious 
for immediate action, and when they found those of sister States hesitating, 
they resolved not to wait for their co-operation. Por a while this question 
divided the Secessionists, but it was soon settled by general co-operation. 
Every thing was favorable to their plans. The governors of all the Slave- 
labor States had been elected by the Democratic party, and Avere ready, with 
the exception of those of Maryland and Delaware, to act in sympathy, if 
not in open co-operation, with the Secessionists. Three, if not four, of the 
leading disunionists were then members of President Buchanan's cabinet,^ and 
tlie President himself and his Attorney-General (Jeremiah S. Black, of Penn- 
sylvania) were ready to declare that the Constitution gave the Executive no 

' The fact Avas imobserved, that in nine of the Slave-labor States the leaders had not put in 
the field an electoral ticket, and therefore an expression of the popular will was not obtained. 
These States were North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Loiiisiann, 
Arkansas, Florida, and Texas — the States which the politicians of each attempted to sever from 
■ the Union. The electors of South Carolina were chosen by the Legislature, and not by the people. 

' Page 544. ^ Page 458. 

' The disloyal members of the cabinet were Howell Cobb, of Georgia, Secretary of the 
Treasury ; John B. Floyd, of Virginia, Secretary of "War ; and Jacob Thompson, of Mississippi, 
Secretary of the Interior. Flov'd and Cobb became general officers in the army of the Con- 
federates. The former perished miserably. Thompson was charged Avith the most heinous 

35 



g^g THE NATION. [I860. 

power to stay the arm of rebellion. Of the President, Jacob Thompson, of 
his cabmet, said : " Buchanan is the truest friend of the South I have ever 
known in the North. He is a jewel of a man.'" Cobb, the Secretary of the 
Treasury, wished to hold back the blow until the close of Buchanan's term, but 
he was overruled by the other disunionists, who counted upon the President's 
passive, if not active, sympathy with them. 

According to agreement, the politicians of South Carolina took the first 
step toward open rebellion. For that purpose, an extraordinary session of the 
Legislature was held at the time of the Presidential election [November 6, 
1860], and on the morning after, when the result was known, the Governor of 
that State was the recipient of many congratulatory electographs from officials 
in Slave-labor States, giving assurance of co-operation.^ In Charleston, badges 
called Palmetto cockades'* were everywhere seen, and they 
were freely worn even in Washington City. Members of 
both Houses of Congress, from South Carolina, made trea- 
sonable speeches at the capital of that State,^ and the Legis- 
lature authorized a convention of delegates, for the purpose 
of declaring the State separated from the Union, and taking 
measures for maintaining what they called the " Sove- 
reignty of South Carolina." The members of that Convention 
were chosen on the 3d of December, and on the IVth of that 




PALMETTO COCKADE. 



month they assembled at Columbia, when the prevalence of 
the small-pox in that city caused them to adjourn to Charles- 
ton. There, on the 20th [December, 1860], they adopted an Ordinance of 
Secession,^ and that evening, in the presence of the Governor and his council, 

crimes during the rebellion, even of complicity in the assassination of President Lincoln. William 
H. Trescot, the Assistant Secretary of State, was also one of the disloyalists; and of Mr. Bu- 
chanan's seven cabinet ministers, only two (General Cass, Secretary of State, and Joseph Holt, 
Postmaster-General) seem to have been wholly disconnected with the plotters against the Gov- 
ernment. 

^ Autograph letter, November 20, 1860. 

" "The people are much excited. North Carolina will secede," said one. "Large numbers 
of Bell men," said another, from Montgomery, Alabama, "headed by T. H. Watts, have declared 
for secession since the announcement of Lincoln's election. The State will undoubtedly secede." 
"The State is ready to assert her rights and independence; the leading men are eager for the 
business," said a dispatch from the capital of Georgia. "If your State secedes," said another, 
from Richmond, "we wiU send you troops and volunteers to aid you," and so from other States 
came greetings and offers of aid. 

^ Made of blue silk ribbon, with a button in the center bearmg the image of a palmetto-tree. 

* James Chestnut, Jr., member of the United States Senate, spoke of the undoubted right of 
South Carolina to secede, and recommended its immediate action in that direction, saying: "The 
other Southern States will flock to our standard." W. W. Boyce, member of Congress, said: 
"I think the only policy for us is to arm as soon as we receive authentic intelligence of the elec- 
tion of Lincoln. It is for South Carolina, in the quickest manner, and by the most direct means, 
to withdraw from the Union. Then we will not submit, whether the other States will act with us 
or with our enemies." 

* This ordinance was drawn by John A. Inghs, and is as follows: "We, the people of Souin 
Carolina, in convention assembled, do declare and ordain, and it is hereby declared and ordained, 
that the ordinance adopted by us in convention, on the twenty-third day of May, in the year of 
our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-eight, whereby the Constitution of the United 
States was ratified, and also all Acts and parts of Acts of the General Assembly of the State, 
ratifying Amendments of the said Constitution, are hereby repealed, and the Union now subsisting 
between South Carolina and other States, under the name of the United States of America, is 
hereby dissolved." 



IS^'l-] buchaxan's administeation. 547 

the Legislature, and a vast concourse of citizens, it was signed in the great 
Hall orf the South Carolina Institute,' by one hundred and seventy of the mem- 
bers. This action was speedily imitated by the politicians in the interest of 
tlie disunionists in the States of Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, 
Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina, and Tennessee." On the 
4th of Fobruar}", 1861, delegates appointed by the secession conventions in six 
of the States in which there had been action on the subject, assembled at 
Montgomery, in Alabama, and formed a league, with the title of Coxfederate 
States of Ameeica.^ A provisional constitution was adopted ; Jefferson 
Davis,* of Mississippi, was chosen *' Provisional President," and Alexander H. 

' See page 540. This building, and othei-s identified with the revolutionary movements of 
the Secessionists and their followers in Charleston, were in ruins early in the Civil War that 
ensued, and long stood as ghastly illustrations of one of the darkest pages in the history of our 
Republic. On the occasion of the signing of the Oi-dinance of Secession, a significant banner 
was hung back of the chair of the president of the convention. Upon it was represented an 
arch composed of fifteen stones (each indicating a Slave-labor State) rising out of a heap of 
broken and disordei'ed stones, representing the Free-labor States. The key-stone was South 
Carolina, on which stood a statue of Calliouu. This banner was a declaration of the inten- 
tion of the convention to destroy the Eepublic, and to erect upon its ruins an empii'e whose 
corner-stone should be slavery. Beneath the design on the banner were the wox'ds: "Built 
FROM THE Ruins." 

^ Secession ordinances were passed in the conventions in the eleven States named, in the fol- 
lowing order: Suuth Carolina, December 20, 1860; 3Iisxis.^ij)jn\ inmunj 9), 1861; Florida, 
January 10; Alabama, January 11; Georgia, 3 SiXm&YjW): Loiiit<i(iua, .January 26; Texas, Feb- 
ruary 1; Virginia, April 17; Arkansas, 'May 6; North Carolina, Jlay 20; I'ermessee, June 8. 

The case of Arkansas is an example of the method of secession. The disunionists, by means 
of Knights of the Golden Circle [see page 520], procured the election of a disloyal Legislature 
and Governor, who called a convention to vote on secession. That convention voted for Uniou 
by a majority of over two-thirds. The foiled Secessionists, by false promises, gained the consent 
of the Unionists to an adjournment, subject to the call of the president, who pretended to be a 
loyal man, but was really one of the disunion ists. It was agreed to refer the question back to the 
people, and that the convention should not reassemble before the vote should be taken in August. 
The president, in violation of that pledge, called the convention in May, soon after Fort Sumter 
was taken. The hall in which the members met was filled by an excited crowd. When the roll 
had been called, a Secessionist offered an Ordinance of Secession, and moved that the "yeas" and 
"nays" on the question should be taken without debate. The president fraudulently declared 
the motion carried ; and when the vote on the Ordinance was taken, and it was foimd that there 
was a majority against it, he arose, and in the midst of cheers and threats of the inob, he urged 
the Unionists to" change their votes to " ay " immediately. It was evident that the mob was 
prepared to execute their threats, and the terrified Unionists complied. There was one excep- 
tion. His name was Mui'piiy. He was compelled to fly for his life. He was the Union Governor 
of the State in 1864. Thus, by fraud and violence, Arkansas was placed in the position of a re- 
bellious State. The Secessionists at once commenced a system of terrorism. Unionists were 
murdered, imprisoned, and exiled. Confederate troops from Texas and Louisiana were brought 
into the State, and Arkansas troops, raised chiefly by fraud and violence, were cent out of the 
State. The voice of opposition was silenced ; and the usurpers, with their feet on the necks of 
the people, proclaimed the unanimity of the inhabitants of Arkansas in favor of disunion! 

' This name does not express the truth. No States, as States, had withdrawn from the 
Union, for the people, who compose a State in our Republic, had never been asked to sanc- 
tion such change. Only certain perso7is in certain Slates were in rebellion against the 
National authority. They usurped the power and suspended the constitutions of several of 
the States; but the confederation formed at Montgomery was only a league of confederated 
leaders, not of States. With this qualification, the name of "Confederate " may be properly 
ajiplied to the insurgents, and in the sense of that qualification it is used in the narrative of 
the Civil War that follows this introduction. 

*■ JefEcrsou Davis was born in Kentucky, on the 3d of June, 1808. He was educated at the 
National Military Academy at West Point, where he was graduated in 1824. He remained in 
the army seven years, and was in the ' ' Black Hawk War " in 1832. He became a cotton-planter 
in Mississippi in 1835. He was a Democratic Presidential Elector in 1844, and was elected to a 
seat in Congress in 1845. He was a colonel of a Mississippi regiment in the war with Mexico. He 
was sent to the National Senate, to fill a vacancy, in 1848, and was regularly elected to that post 



548 



THE NATIOX. 



[18G1, 




JEFFERSON DAVIS. 



Stephens, ' of Georgia, ' ' Vice-Presideut. " And tliis organization of disunion- 
ists, wholly the work of politicians (for no ordinance of secession was ever 

submitted to the jjeo^jle), made war upon 
the Republic, by seizing forts, arsenals, 
ships, custom-houses, and other public 
property, and raising armies for the 
overthrow of the government. 

In the mean time Congress had assem- 
bled [December 3, 1860] at the National 
Capital, and tlie disunionists in both 
Houses were outspoken, truculent, and 
defiant. The President's message pleased 
nobody. It was full of evidence of faint- 
heartedness and indecision, on points 
where courage and positive convictions 
should have been apparent in its treat- 
ment of the great topic then filling all 
hearts and minds ; and it bore painful indications that its author was involved 
in some perilous dilemma, from which he was anxiously seeking a way of 
escape. It contained many patriotic sentiments, which offended the Secession- 
ists, but it contained more that was calculated to alarm the loyal people of 
the land. It declared substantially, under the advice of the Attorney-General, 
that the Executive possessed no constitutional power to use the army and 
navy for the preservation of the life of the Republic ; and from the time of its 
promulgation until his term of office expired, three months later, the President 
sat with folded arms, as it were, while the Secessionists were perfecting their 
horrid enginery for destroying the Nation.'' Encouraged by his declaration 
of the weakness of the government, and the assurances of leaders of his party 
in the Free-labor States that they need not fear interference,' they worked in 

in 1851. President Pierce called him to his cabinet, as Secretary of War, in 1853. He again 
entered the Senate, on his retirement from tlie War Department, in 1857, and was there con- 
spicuous as one of the conspirators against the life of the Republic. In February, 1861, he was 
elected "Provisional Presidentof the Confederate Statesof America,"and in 18t)2, "Permanent 
President." At the close of the Civil War he was captured, and confined in Fortress Monroe, 
charged with high crimes. He was released on bail, and has never been brought to trial. 

' Stephens, with an air of real sincerity, had made a plea for the Union, at the capital of 
Georgia, in November, 1860. By his own'private confession it was only a political trick. He 
and Robert Toombs, one of the leading disunionists in Georgia, were aspirants for the supre- 
macy as political leaders in that State. Toombs was an open Secessionist. Stephens expect- 
ed to debase him by taking a stand for the Union, but was defeated ; and within the space of 
three months he was the second officer in the so-called "government" of the Secessionists, 
and working with them in trying to destroy what he had declared to be the fairest poUtieal 
fabric on the face of the earth. " 

- After arguing that even Congress had no constitutional right to do more than defend the 
publicproperty, the Attorney-General intimated that if it should attempt to do more, the peo- 
ple of the Slave-labor States interested in the matter- would be justified in rebelling — "would 
be compelled to act accordingly." He wished to know whether, under such circumstances, 
all the States would "not be absolved from their Federal obligations." He virtually coun- 
seled the President to allow the Republic to be destroyed by its internal foes, rather than ta 
use force for its preservation ; and the Chief iMagistrate followed his advice. 

' At a large political meeting in Philadelphia, on the 16th of January, 1861, one of the resolu- 
tions declared : ' ' We are utterly opposed to any such compulsion as is demanded by a portion of 
the Republican party; and the "Democratic party of the North will by all constitutional means. 



isoi.] Buchanan's administration. 549 

■open sunshine with the avowed intention of overthrowing the government. 
They seized i)ublic property, and fired upon the National flag, even before they 
had formed their league at Montgomery ; and when their plans were fairly 
mcltured, the Secessionists in Congress, after rejecting every peaceful proposi- 
tion that might be made, consistent with the dignity and safety of the govern 
ment,' both in that body and in a peace convention held at Washington City* 
[February 4, 18G0], formally withdrew from the National Legislature, with 
tlie sivowal that Avar upon their government was tJieir object. And yet there 
sat the Chief Magistrate of the Republic in passive obedience to some malig- 
nant will, liolding in his hands the lightning of power confided to him by the 
people, by which, in a moment, as it Avere, he might have consumed those 
enemies of the Constitution and violators of the law. 

Charleston harbor had now become the seething caldron of rebellion. 
Major Robert Anderson,' a loyal Kentuckian, was in command of the fortifi- 
cations there. He had warned his goA'ernment of the evident intention of the 
South Carolina Secessionists to seize their strongholds, and had urged it to 
employ measures for their protection. Floyd, a Virginian disunionist, then 
Secretary of War, and Avho had stripped the arsenals of the North and filled 
those of the South, preparatory to rebellion, paid no attention to his entreaties. 
Finally, Avhen it Avas evident to Anderson that the South Carolinians intended 
to seize the forts, and capture his little garrison of less than one hundred men, 
he took the latter ivom the Aveaker fort Moultrie, and placed them, Avitli his 
sujiplies, in stronger fort Sumter, where he might defy all assailants. This 
act astounded and exasperated the Secessionists. The disloyal Secretary of 
War rebuked the loyal commander, but the patriotic people blessed him for 

and with its moral and political influence, oppose any such extreme policy, or a fratricidal war 
thus to be inaugurated." On the 22d of February, a political State Convention was held at Hai"- 
risburg, thecapitalof Pennsylvania, when the memberssaid, in a resolution: "Wewill, by all 
proper and legitimate means, oppose, discountenance, and prevent any attempt on the part of 
the Republicans in power to make any armed aggressions upon the Southern States, especially 
so long as laws contravening their rights shall remain unrepealed on the statute-books of Nortli- 
ern States [Personal Liberty Laws, see page 536], and so long as the just demands of the South 
shall continue to be unrecognized by the Republican majorities in these States, and unsecured 
by proper amendatory explanations of tlie Constitution. " Such utterances in the gi-eat State of 
Pennsylvania, and similar ones elsewhere, by the chosen representatives of a powerful party in 
conventions assembled, encouraged the disunionists in a belief that there would be no war made 
upon them, and for that reason they were defiant everywhere and. on all occasions. 

■ In the Senate of the United States, John J. Crittenden, of Kentucky, offered amendments 
to the Constitution and a series of joint resolutions, known as the "Crittenden Compromise," 
AV'hich formed as perfect a guaranty for the protection and perpetuation of the slave system as 
the slaveholders had ever, hitherto, asked for. Had the Secessionists not been determined on 
the destruction of the Republic, this would have been satisfactory. But they rejected it; nor 
did it meet with any favor on the part of the Republicans. 

'For the purpose of gaining time to perfect their disloyal schemes, the Secessionists of Vir- 
ginia iilanned a conference of delegates from all the States, to consider measures for averting 
Civil War. The President favored the movement. Delegates from twenty-one States assembled 
in Washington City on the 4th of February, 1861. John Tyler, of Virginia [see page 476], 
was chosen president. A plan was adopted, having aU of the essential features of the ' ' Critten- 
den Compromise." Tyln- ;nid liis associates from Virginia pretended to acquiesce in this result, 
and in his closing address, a Tier solemn asseverations of satisfaction, he said: "So far as in me 
lios, Ishall recommend itsaili)])ti()u." Thirty-six hours afterward, in a speech in Richmond, he 
cast otf the mask of dissimulation, and denounced the Peace Convention and its doings. He 
thcrcnftcr labored with all his might to precipitate Virginia into the vortex of Revolution, 
and was successful. 



550 



THE NATION. 



[18G1. 



the glorioii-s deed. The intelligence of it increased tlie excitement in the !Nu- 
tionul capital, caused by the discovery of a heavy robbery of Indian Trust 
Bonds, held in the Department of the Interior:^— acrime in wh'cli the Secretary 
of "War was involved — and a session of the cabinet on the 27tli was a storfny 
one. The dismayed Secessionists in that council discovered that the President 
was not disposed to follow them into paths of 
actual treason. Floyd, fearing the consequences 
of his exposed villany, resigned the seals of his 
office and ficd to Virginia, where his fellow- 
disunionists gave him a public dinner. He was 
succeeded in office by Joseph Holt. A recon- 
struction of the cabinet, with sounder materials, 
immediately followed,' and the loyal people felt 
some assurance of safety. 

The first two months of the year 1861 was a* 
period of great anxiety and gloom. Business 
was prostrated. Cobb, the disunionist, had used 
his power as Secretary of the Treasury, in injur- 
ing, as far as possible, the public credit. Pre- 
parations for rebellion were seen on every side. The Secessionists in Con- 
gress were withdrawing from that body, and disloyal men in conventions 
were declaring the secession of States. The President remained a passive 
sj)ectator of the maturing mischief. The General-in-Chief of the Army (Lieu- 
tenant-General Scott) was feeble in mind and body, and as the time approached 
for the inauguration of Mr. Lincoln, evidence appeared that Secessionists in 
Baltimore, in their desperation, had determined to assassinate him. Warned 
of this, he succeeded in passing through Baltimore, where the tragedy was to 
be performed, unnoticed, and, to the chagrin and even consternation of the 
disunionist men, he suddenly appeared in Washington City on the morning 
of the 23d of February, and remained there until his inauguration. 




ROBERT ANDERSON. 



' General Cass, the Secretary of State, who had discoveretl-the treasonable designs of some 
of his associates, liad resigned some time before, and his place was filled by the Attorney- 
General. Edwin M. Stanton was called to the Attorney-Generalship, and John A. Dix was 
made Secretary of the Treasury in place of Cobb, who had gone to Georgia to assist .in plung- 
ing the people'of that State into the vortex of rebellion. Holt, Dix, and Stanton were loyal 
men, and thwarted by their vigilance and energy the schemes of the Secessionists to seize the 
government before the President-elect should be inaugurated, "We intend, "said one of the 
disunionists, "to take possession of the Army and Navy, and of the archives of the govern- 
ment ; not allow the electoral votes to be counted ; proclaim Buchanan Provisional Presi- 
dent, if he will do as we wish, and if not, choose another ; seize the Harper's Ferry Arsenal 
and the Norfolk Navy Yard simultaneously, and, sending armed men down from the for- 
mer, and armed vessels up from the latter, take possession of Washington, and establish a 
new government." 



1861.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 55I 

CHAPTER XVI. 

LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. [I8G1 — 1865.] 

Abraham Lincoln,* tlie sixteenth President of the Republic, was inaugu- 
rated on the 4th day of March, 1861, under circumstances of peculiar interest. 
In expectation of open violence on the part of the disunionists, and their 
adherents. General Scott had made ample provision for the preservation of 
order by the strong arm of military power, if it should be necessary. This 
fact was known, and no disorder occurred. The oath of office was adminis- 
tered by Chief Justice Taney as quietly as on former occasions ; and with a firm, 
voice the new President read from the eastern portico of the Caj^itol to the 
assembled thousands his remarkable Inaugural Address. In it he expressed 
the most kindly feelings toward the people of every portion of the Republic, 
and his determination to administer the government impartially for the protec- 
tion of every citizen and every interest. At the same time he announced his 
resolution to enforce the laws, protect the public property, and repossess that 
which had already been seized by the insurgents. The vast multitude then 
dispersed, and in the evening the usual pageant of an Inauguration Ball was 
seen. On the following day the Senate, relieved of most of the disunionists 
confirmed the President's cabinet nominations,"^ and the new administration 
began its memorable career. 

The first business of the new cabinet was to ascertain the condition of the 
nation, especially its resources, and its ability to meet the crisis of rebellion, 
evidently at hand. Cobb had deeply injured the public credit, but the loyal 
men in Congress had adopted measures for restoring it. The army and navy 
promised very little aid. The former was composed of only 16,000 men, and 
these were principally on the frontiers of the Indian country,^ while sixteen 
forts had already been seized by the insurgents, with all the arsenals in the 
cotton-growing States.^ The little navy, like the army, had been placed far 

^ See note 1, page 543. 

^ He nominated William H. Seward, of New York, for Secretary of State ; Salmon P. Chase, 
of Ohio, for Secretary of the Treasury ; Simon Cameron, of Pennsylvania, for Secretary of War; 
Gideon Wells, of Connecticut, for Secretary of the Navy ; Caleb Smith, of Indiana, for Secretary 
of the Interior; Montgomery Blair, of Maryland, for Postmaster-General; and Edward Bates, of 
Missouri, for Attorney-Getieral 

^ Many of the officers of the army were natives of Slave-labor States, and a greater portion 
of these not only abandoned their flag and joined the insurgents, but attempted to corrupt the 
patriotism of the common soldiers. Among the most flagrant acts of this kind was the conduct of 
General Davia E. Twiggs, whom Floyd had placed in command of the troops in Texas, to assist 
in the work of rebellion. He first tried to seduce the troops from their allegiance. Failing in this, 
he betrayed them into the hands of the enemies of their country in February, 1861. His command 
included nearly one-half of the military force of the United States. They were surrendered to 
the rebeUious "authorities of Texas," with public property valued at $ '"■iSO.OOO. 

* The defensive works within the "seceding States," as they were called, were about thirty 
in number, and mounting over .3,000 guns. The cost of these works and their equipment was at 
least $'20,000,000. It is estimated that the value of National property which the insurg 
seized before the close of Buchanan's administration was at least $30,000,000. 



552 



THE NATION. 



[1861. 



beyond the immediate use of the government. Only forty-two vessels were in 
•commission, and the entire force immediately available for the defense of the 
whole Atlantic coast of the Republic was the Brooklyn^ of twenty-five guns, 
and a store-ship. A large number of naval officers, born in Slave-labor States, 
had resigned ; and weakness and confusion in that arm of the public service 
were everywhere visible. The public offices were swarming with disloyal 
men. It was difficult to decide who were and who were not trustworthy, and 
as it was necessary for the President to have proper implements to work with, 
he was engaged for nearly a month after his inauguration in exchanging false 
for true men in the employment of the government. He knew that rising 
rebellion could not be suppressed by proclamations, unless the insurgents saw 
behind tliem the invincible ])ower of the State, ready to be wielded by the 
President, with trusty instrumentalities. These he endeavored to find. 




FORT SUMTER IN 1861. 

Meanwhile rebellion was open and defiant, especially at Charleston. Soon 
after Major Anderson transferred his garrison to Fort Sumte?-,' the insurgents, 
who at once flocked to Charleston, began the erection of fortifications for the 
purpose of dislodging him. They seized the other forts that were for the 
defense of the harbor, and when, so early as the second week in January, a 
government vessel {^Star of tJie West) attempted to enter with men and pro- 
visions for Fort Sumter, and with the National flag at her fore, she was fired 



Page 549. 



3861.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 553 

upon by great guns aiiJ driven to sea.' When the Confederation was formed 
at Montgomery,'- they commissioned Major P. G. T. Beauregard, a Louisiana 
•Creole, who had deserted liis flag, a brigadier-general, and sent him to com- 
mand the insurgents at Charleston. Under his direction Fort Sumter was 
besieged; and when, early in April [1861], the government informed the authori- 
ties of South Carolina that supplies would be sent to Fort Sumter peaceably 
or forcibly, Beauregard was ordered by Davis and his fellow-disunionists to 
demand its immediate surrender. This was done [April 11], when Anderson, 
whose supplies were nearly exhausted, agreed to evacuate the fort within five 
days, if he should receive no relief from his government. Hoping to " fire the 
Southern heart " by bloodshed, the Secessionists would not wait for so peace- 
able a way for gaining possession, and under their direction Beauregard, with 
thousands of armed men at his back, opened full thirty heavy guns and mor- 
tars upon the fort [April 12], which was defended by only about seventy men.* 
The little garrison gallantly responded, and fought bravely, with a hope that 
a naval expedition, which they knew had been sent for their relief, might 
arrive in time to raise the siege. A heavy storm prevented the succor. Pro- 
visions were exhausted. The buildings in the fort were set on fire by the 
shells of the insurgents, and a greater portion of the gunpowder had to be 
emptied into the sea, to prevent its ignition by the flames. Finally, hopeless 
of aid, and almost powerless, Anderson agreed to evacuate the fort. This he 
did on Sunday, the 14th, and retired with the garrison to the government 
vessels hovering outside the harbor, bearing away the flag of Fort Sumter. 
Precisely four years afterward [April 1 4, 1 865j he took it back, and raised it 
again over the fortress, then an almost shapeless mass of ruins. He evacuated^ 
but did not surrender Fort Sumter^ and he and its flag, the emblem of the 
sovereignty of his government, wei-e borne to New York.^ Thus commenced 



CIVIL AVAR, IN 1861. 



Twenty-four hours after the evacuation of Fort Sumter, the President issued 
a proclamation, in which he called out the militia of the country for three 

' This overt act of treason and of war was commended by the Leorislature of South Carolina, 
■which resolved, unanimouslj', "That this General Assembly learns with pride and pleasure of the 
Buccessful resistance this day by the troops of this State, acting under the orders of the Governor, 
to an attempt to re-enforce Fort Sumter." The public press of Charleston said: " We are proud 
that our harbor has been so honored," and declared that " if the red seal of blood Avas yet lacking 
to the parchment of their liberties," there should be " blood enough to stamp it all in red! For, 
by the God of our fathers," shouted the exultant journalist, "the soil of South Carolina shall he 
free!'' — Gharleston iMercuri/, January 9, 1861. 

^ Page 547. 

^ A Virginia Congressman, named Roger A. Pryor, made a speech in the streets of Charleston 
■on tli.^ night of the 10th. A convention was then in session in Virginia, in which tlie Union- 
ists were holding the Secessionists in cheek. Pryor, in defending the seeming hesitancy of his 
State, said: " Do not distrust Virginia. Strike a blow! The very moment that blood is shed, 
Old Virginia will make common cause with her sisters of the South." This cry for blood was 
telegraphed to Montgomery tlie next morning. It was consonant with the malevolent spirit of 
the more zealous Secessionists owrywhere. Gilchrist, a member ol' the Alabama Legislature, 
said to Davis, Walker, Benjamin, and 3Iemminger : " Gentlemen, unless you sprinkle blood in 
the face of the people of Alabama, they will he back in the old Union in less tlian ten days." And 
so Davis and his " Cabinet "■unk'nul liciincgard to shed blood, and "fire the Southern heart." 

* F. W. Pickens, then Governor of South Carolina, made the evacuation of Sumter the occa- 



55-1 THE NATION. [1861. 

months' service, to the number of seventy-five thousand men, to suppress the- 
rising rebellion/ The Secretary of War simultaneously issued a requisition 
upon the several States for their prescribed quota.'"' These calls were received 
with unbounded favor and enthusiasm throughout the Fi-ee-labor States. In 
the six Slave-labor States included in the call, they were treated with scorn 
and defiance, the Governors sending insulting responses to the President, while 
Davis and his fellow-disunionists at Montgomery received the Proclamation 
with " derisive laughter." In the Free-labor States there was a wonderful 
Tiprising of the people. Nothing like it, in sublimity of aspect, had beea 
seen on the earth since Peter the Hermit and Pope U'"ban the Second filled all 
Christian Europe with religious zeal, and sent armed hosts, with the cry of 
" God wills it ! God wills it !" to rescue the Sepulcher of Jesus from the hands 
of the infidel. The Republic was to be rescued from the hands of the assassin. 
Men, women, and children felt the enthusiasm alike ; and, as if by preconcert- 
ed arrangement, the National flag Avas everywhere displa^'ed, even from the 
spires of churches and cathedrals. In cities, in villages, at way-side inns, all 
over the country, it was imfurled from lofty poles in the presence of large 
assemblies of people, who Avere addressed frequently by some of the most 
eminent orators in the land. It adorned the halls of justice and the sanctua- 
ries of religion; and the "Red, White, and Blue," the colors of the flag in 
combination, became ornaments of women and tokens of the loyalty of men. 

The uprising in the Slave-labor -States at the same time, though less general 
and enthusiastic, was nevertheless marvelous. The heresy of State supre- 
macy, which Calhoun^ and his disciples adroitly called State ric/hts, because a 
ri(/ht is a sacred thing cherished by all, was a political tenet generally accepted 
as orthodox,* It had been inculcated in every conceivable form, and on every 
conceivable occasion ; and men Avho loved the Union and deprecated secession 
were in agreement with the Secessiouists on that point. Hence it was that, in 
the tornado of passion then sweeping over the South, where reason was dis- 

sion for an exultant speech in the streets of Charleston, on that Sunday. " Thank God." he 
exclaimed, " the ^\'ar is open, and we will conquer or perish. "We have humbled the flag of the 
United States." Alluding to his State as a sovereignty, he said, " That proud flag was never 

lowered before to any nation on the earth It has been humbled to-day before the glorious 

little State of S9uth Carolina." The churches of Charleston that day were resonant with disloyal 
harangues. In old St. Philip's the venerable and blind Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal 
Church cried out : " Your boj'S were there, and mine were there, and it was right that they should 
be there." And in the Roman Catholic Cathedral Bishop Lynch had a Te Deum chanted in grati» 
tude to God for the beginning of the most liorrid civil war on record 1 

' The President's authority for this act may be found in the second and third sections of an 
act of Congress approved February 28, 1795. That law would not allow the President to hold 
them to service for more than three months. 

^ The quota of each State was as follows, the figures denoting the number of regiments : 
Maine. 1 ; New Hampshire, 1 ; Vermont, 1 ; Massachusetts, 2 ; Rhode Island, 1 ; Connecticut, 1 ; 
New York, 17; New Jersey, 6; Pennsylvania, 16; Delaware, 1; Tennessee, 2; Maryland, 4: 
Virginia, 3; North Carohna, 2; Kentucky, -1; Arkansas, 1; Missouri. 4; Ohio. 13; Indiana, 6; 
Illinois, 6; Michigan, 1 ; Iowa, 1; Minnesota, 1; Wisconsin, 1; 

^ See note 3, page 459. 

* This was in the form of a political dogma, which declares that each State is a sovereign; that 
the Union is only a league of sovereign States, and not a nationality ; that the States are not sub- 
servient to the National government ; were not created by it, do not belong to it, and that they 
created that government, whose powers they delegate to it, and that to them it is responsible. 
Such was the essential substance of the old Confederation, before the National Constitution was 



1861.] LINCOLX'S A D MINI ST R ATI OX. 555 

carded, thousands of intelligent men, deceived by the grossest misrepresenta- 
tions respecting the temper, character, and intentions of the people of the 
Free-labor States, flew to arms, well satisfied that they were in the right, 
because resisting Avhat they believed to be usurpation, and an unconstitutional 
attemj^t at the subjugation of a free people on the part of the National gov- 
ernment. 

Within a week after the attack on Fort Sumter the insurrection assumed 
the huge proportions of a great rebellion. Its forces were at work in all the 
Slave-labor States, and the most extraordinary exertions were immediately put 
forth by the disunionists to execute the first and most important part of their 
plan, namely, the seizure of the National Capital. Thousands of their follow- 
ers, armed with weapons taken from their government, were pressing into Vir- 
ginia for that purpose. At the time of his inauguration at 3Iontgomery' Jef- 
ferson Davis had said : " We are now determined to maintain our position, 
and make all who oppose us smell Southern powder and feel Southern steel /" 
and he now began to carry out that threat with a high hand, while his lieuten- 
ant, Alexander II. Stephens, who a few months before had declared and proven, 
that rebellion against the government would be a monstrous crime,- now hur- 
ried toward Richmond, making Georgia, the Carolinas, and Virginia ring with 
his cry of " On to Washington P'' Le Roy Pope Walker, Davis's "Secretary 
of War,'"* had j^rophesied on the day when Fort Sum- 
ter was attacked [April 12, 1861], saying: "The flag 
that now flaunts the breeze here will float over the 
dome of the old capitol at Washington before the 
first of May. Let them try Southern chivalry, and 
test the extent of Southern resources, and it may 
float eventually over Faneuil Hall, in Boston." The 
most intense desire to seize Washington City pre- 

• 1 J ^1 • ill 1 ii 1 THE CONFEDERATE FLAG.' 

vailed among the insurgent leaders, and the people 

of the cotton-planting States soon realized the promise uttered by Governor 
Pickens : " You may plant your seed in peace, for Old Virginia will have to 
bear the brunt of battle." 

Virginia did, indeed, bear much of the brunt of battle. It was now in an 
uproar, and its people was soon made to feel the terrible efiects of the treason 
of some of their leading politicians. They had assembled a convention to 
consider the subject of secession from the Union. The Unionists were the 

framed. That Constitution refutes this heresy of State sovereignty and supremacy, in terms and 
spirit: "We, the People," says its preamble, "do ordain and establish," &c. That Constitution 
was the work of the 'people^ not of State organizations ; and it is the political creator of every Stale 
since admitted into the Union, first as a Territory, and then as a State, solely by the exercise of 
the potential will of the people, expressed through Congress. Without the consent of Congress, 
under the provisions of the Constitution, no State can enter the Union. The National govern- 
ment is the creator of the States. See Section 3, Article IV. of the National Constitution. 

' Page 547. 

" See Lossing's Pictorial History of the Civil War, vol. I., pages 54 to 57, inclusive. 

' Page 541. 

* This is a picture of the flag of the "Southern Confederacy" adopted by the Secessionists 
and first unfurled over the State-House at Montgomery on the 4th of March, 1861. 




556 THE NATION. '^ [1861. 

majority in that body. The crisis had now come. The blow had been struck. 
Tlie bloodshed evoked by the impassioned Pryor had occurred. Virginia, within 
whose ancient embrace was the capital of the nation to be destroyed, must be 
actively on the side of the conspirators, or all might be lost. Maryland, on 
the other side of the District of Columbia, was a doubtful auxiliary, for her 
loyal Governor and peoi^le were holding treason and rebellion in check in that 
State. The violent spirit of the disunionists everywhere manifested must not 
bo backward in Virginia, the mother of Disunion ; so the politicians, perceiv- 
ing [April 16] that if the seats of ten Unionists in the convention could be 
made vacant an ordinance of secession might be passed, waited upon that 
number of such men and gave them the choice of voting for secession, keeping 
away from the convention, or being hanged. They kept away. The secession 
ordinance was adopted [April 17, 1861], and in defiance of an order of the 
convention that it should be submitted to a vote of the people, a committee 
appointed by that body, witli John Tyler at its head,' concluded a treaty with 
Alexander H. Stephens, acting in behalf of Jefferson Davis, by which their 
commonwealth was placed under the absolute military control of the Con- 
federacy. This was done witliin a week [April 25, 1861] after the Ordinance 
of Secession was passed, and a month before the time appointed for its submis- 
sion to the people. When that day arrived, fraud and violence deprived the 
latter of their right.' Virginia became a part of the Confederacy, and, by 
invitation of its politicians, who had dragged the people into the vortex of 
revolution, the so-called " government " of the conspirators was transferred 
from Montgomery to Richmond, and there it remained during the war that 
ensued. 

While troops were hurrying toward Washington from the Slave-labor 
States, to seize it, others, in larger numbers, were flocking from the Free-labor 
States to defend it. The secessionists of Maryland were active, and tried to 
place a barrier in the way of tlie loyal men in Baltimore, through which city 
they were compelled to pass. They slightly assailed some Pennsylvanians 
(five unai-med companies) who passed through on the 18th of April, and 
were the first of its defenders to reach the National capital;* and on the 
following day a mob of ten thousand men assailed a single Massachusetts regi- 
ment (the Sixth), as it marched from one railway station to the other, A fight 
ensued. Lives were lost.^ The loyal people of the nation were terribly exas- 
perated, and it was with difficulty that the city in Avhich the tragedy occurred 

' The commissioners consisted of John Tyler, 'William Ballard Preston, S. M. McD. Moore, 
James P. Holcombe, James C. Bruce, and Lewis E. Harvie. 

^ The bayonet was ready everywhere to control the elections. That Union men might be 
kept from the polls, Mason, the author of the Fugitive Slave Law [page 522], addressed a public 
letter to the people, telling those who were disposed to vote against the Ordinance that they must 
not vote at all, "and if they retain such opinions the ij must leave the State.'" He asserted in 
another form Jefferson Davis's threat, that all opposers should " smell Southern powder and feel 
Southern steel." 

' There were the Washington Artillery auA National Light Infantry coxn-panies of Pottsville; 
the Ringgold Light Artillery, of Reading; the Logan Guards, of Lewistown; and the Allen Infantry, 
of Allentown. 

* The mob, encouraged by the Chief of Pohce (G. P. Kane) and well-known citizens, assaileo 



1861.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



ssr 



was preserved from destruction. " Turn upon it the guns of Fort McHenry," 
said one. " Lay it in ashes !" cried another. " Fifty thousand men may be 
raised in an hour to march through Baltimore," exclaimed a third ; and one of 
our popular poets (Bayard Taylor) wrote : — 

" Bow down in haste thy guilty head I 

God's wrath is swift and sure: 
The sky with gathering bolts is red — 
Cleanse from thy skirts the slaughter-shed, 
Or make thyself an ashen bed 

Baltimore I" 

The defenders of the capital Avere not there any too soon. Already the 
Virginians had begun to play their part in the plan for seizing Washington. 
On the passage of the ordinance of secession by the Virginian convention,' 




HARPER S FERRY IN THE SUMMER 



1861. 



Governor Letcher proclaimed the independence of the State and his recognition 
of the Confederacy; and, less than twenty-four hours afterward, troops were in 
motion for seizing Harper's Ferry and the Navy Yard near Norfolk." Warned 
of their approach, and his force too small to make successful resistance. Lieu- 
tenant Jones, who was in command at Harper's Ferry, set fire to the Annory 
and Arsenal buildings there [April 18], and withdrew into Pennsylvania. The 



the troops with every sort of missile. Two of the troops were killed. One was mortally and 
several were slightly wounded. Nine citizens of Baltimore were killed, and a considerable num- 
ber were wounded. 

» Page 556. ' See note 1, page 550. 



558 THE NATION. [1861. 

insurgents took j^ossession of the post, and were about to march upon Wash' 
ington, when they heard of its armed occupation by loyal men. At the same 
time, Virginians were before the Navy Yard at Gosport, opposite Norfolk, 
demanding its surrender. The commander of the station (Commodore McAu- 
ley) finding disloyalty to be rife among his officers, and apprehending immediate 
danger from foes without, prepared to abandon the post without resistance, and 
to scuttle the vessels. Commodore Paulding arrived Avhile the vessels were 
sinking, and finding it to be too late to save them, he ordered them and the 
buildings of the navy yard to be fired. An immense amount of property 
was destroyed, and the Virginians, on taking possession, acquired, as spoils, 
about two thousand cannon. These armed many a battery throughout the 
Confederacy soon afterward. 

The National capital was still in great danger. Thousands of insurgents 
from below the Roanoke were pouring into Virginia and pressing up toward 
Washington, while, for about a week, all communication between the capital 
and the loyal States was cut ofiT. Under the sanction of the Mayor and 
Chief of Police of Baltimore, the bridges of the railways extending northward 
from that city Avere burned on the night after the massacre in its sti'eets, and 
the telegraph-wires were cut. The President and his cabinet and the General-in- 
chief of the Army were virtual prisoners in the capital for several days, and 
were relieved just in time to prevent their actual capture, by the energy of the 
veteran General John E. Wool, and the Union Defense Committee of New York 
City, in forwarding troops and supplies in a manner to avoid the blockade of the 
direct highway at Baltimore, and to secure the capital. The well-known Seventh 
Regiment of New York and some Massachusetts troops, under General Ben- 
jamin F. Butler, proceeded by water to Annapolis [April 21], seized the railway 
between that city and its junction with the one leading from Baltimore to 
Washington [April 25], and took possession a few days later at the Relay 
House, nine miles from the former city, where the Baltimore and Ohio Railway 
turns northward toward Harper's Ferry. From that point, on the evening of 
the 13th of May, Butler, with a little more than one thousand men, went into 
Baltimore, under cover of intense darkness and a thunder-storm, and quietly 
took post on Federal Hill, an eminence commanding the city.' The first inti- 
mation the citizens received of his presence was a proclamation from him, 
published in a newspaper the next morning, assuring all peaceable persons of 
full protection, and intimating that a greater force was at hand, if needed, for 
the purposes of the outraged government. Troops then passed quietly through 
Baltimore to Washington City,' and at the middle of May the capital was 
safe. Thus rebellion in Maryland was throttled at the beginning, and it was 
kept from very serious mischief during the war that ensued.^ 

1 Butler's troops consisted of the entire Sixth Massachusetts, which was attacked in Baltimore 
on the 19th of April [page 556] ; a part of the New York Eighth ; Boston artillerymen, and 
two field-pieces. They were placed in cars, headed, as a feint, toward Harper's Ferry. At 
evening they were backed into Baltimore, just as a heavy thunder-storm was about to break 
over tlie city, and the troops, well piloted, went quietly to Federal Hill. 

■■' Three days earher [May 10] Pennsylvanian troops passed unmolested through Baltimore to 
"Washington, under Colonel Patterson. 

' General Scott had planned an expedition for the seizure of Baltimore, to consist of four 



1861.] LIXCOLK's ADMINISTRATIO?r. 559 

At the beginning of Mny, by violence and otber metbods, tbe Secessionists 
and tbeir friends bad seized tbe government property to the amount of 140,- 
000,000 ; put about forty tbousaud armed men in tbe field, more tban half of 
wboni were then concentrating in Virginia ; sent emissaries abroad, witb tbe 
name of " commissioners," to seek recognition and aid from foreign powers ;' 
commissioned numerous "privateers " to prey upon tbe commerce of the United 
States ;* extinguished the luminaries of light-houses and beacons along the coasts 
of the Slave-labor States, from Hampton Roads to the Rio Grande,^ and enlisted 
actively in their revolutionary schemes the governors of thirteen States, and large, 
numbers of leading politicians in other States/ Encouraged by their success 
in Charleston harbor,^ they were investing Fort Pickens, which had been saved 
from seizure by the vigilance and energy of Lieutenant Slemmer, its commander.® 
Insurrection had become Rebellion ; and the loyal people of the country 
and the National government, beginning to comprehend the magnitude, po^ 
tency, and meaning of the movement, accepted it as such, and addressed 
themselves earnestly to the task of its suppression. The President called [May 

columns of three thousand men each, to approach it simultaneously from different points. Butler, 
by bold and energetic action, accomplished the desired end in one night, with a thousand men. 
Scott could not forgive him for this independent action. He demanded his removal from the 
command of that department. The President complied, promoted Butler to Major-General, and 
gave liim a more important command, with his liead-quarters at Fortress Monroe. 

' These were William L. Yancey [see page 544], of Alabama; P. A. Rost, of Louisiana; A. 
Dudley Mann, of Virginia, and T. Butler King, of Georgia. Yancey was to operate in England, 
Rost in France, and Maun in Holland and Belgium. King seems to have had a kind of roving 
commission. These men so fitly represeuted their bad cause ia Europe, that confidence in ils 
justice and ultimate success was so speedily impaired, that they went wandering about, seeking 
in vain for willing listeners among men of character in diplomatic circles, and they finally aban- 
doned their missions with disgust, to the relief of European statesmen, who were wearied with 
their importunities and offended by their duplicity. 

- Davis summoned his so-called "Congress "' to meet at Montgomery on the 29th of April. 
He had already announced, by proclamation [April 17, 1861], his determination to euiplo_y 
"privateers" against the commerce of the United States, and the "Confederate Congress" 
now authorized the measure, with the unrighteous offer, by the terms of the Act, of a bounty 
of $20 for the destruction, by fire, water, or otherwise, on the high seas, of every man, woman, 
or cliild — "each person" — ^that might be found by these "privateers." That the men en- 
gaged in this business, under the sanction of the Secessionists, were pirates, is shown by the 
laws of nations. Piracy is defined as "robbery on the high seas without authority." Davis, 
Toombs, and their fellow-disunionists had no more authority to commission privateers, as 
legalized pirates are called, than had Jack Cade, Nat. Turner, or John Brown, for they repre- 
sented no acknowledged government on the face of the earth. 

* The light-houses and beacons darkened by them, between Cape Henry, in Virginia, and 
Point Isabel, in Texas, numbered 133. 

'' These were Letcher, of Virginia; Magoffin, of Kentucky; Ellis, oT North Carolina; Harris, of 
Tennessee; Jackson, oi Missouri; Pickens, of South Carolina; Brown, of Georgia, Moore, of Ala- 
havvi; Pettus, of Missi^istppi; Rector, of Arkansas ; Moore, of Louisiana; Perry, of Florida; and 
Burton, of Delaware. OxAj Governor Hicks, of Maryland, and Houston, of Texas, of the fifteen 
Slave-labor States, were loyal to the National government. The former remained so until his 
death ; but Houston yielded in the course of a few months, and became a reviler of the President 
and the loyal people. 

=■ Page 553. 

" Karly in January [1861], Lieutenant Slemmer received information that Fort Pickens and 
other fortifications on Pensacola Bay, under his charge, would be seized by the Governor of 
Florida. He took measures accordingly. Observing a gathering cloud of danger, he placed all 
the public property he possibly could, and his garrison, in stronger Fort Pickens. The insurgents 
seized the Navy Yard on the Main (Fort Pickens is on Santa Rosa Island), and tried to secure 
the fort, but in vain. Slemmer held it until he was re-enforced, at about the time when Fort 
Sumter was abandoned, when a large number of troops, under General Bragg (who had aban- 
doned his flag), were besieging it. 



560 



THE ?fATIO]Sr. 



[1861.. 



3, 1861] for sixty-four thousand more troops (volunteers) to serve " during the 
war,'' and eighteen thousand men for the navy. Forts Monroe and Pickens 
were re-enforced, and tlie blockade of the Southern ports, out of which the 
Secessionists were preparing to send cruisers, Avas proclaimed. 

The first care of the government was to secure the safety of the capital, and' 
for this purpose Washington City and its vicinity was made the general gath- 
ering-place of all the troops raised eastward of the Alleghany Mountains. 
When, on the 4th of July, Congress met in extraordinary session, pursuant to 
the call of the President, in his proclamation for troops on the 15th of April/ 
there were about 230,000 volunteers in the field, independent of the three^ 
months' men, a larger portion of whom were within ten miles of the capital. 
Congress approved the act of the President in calling them out, and authorized 
[July 10, 1861] the raising of 500,000 troops, and an appropriation of 
$500,000,000 to defray the expenses of the kindling Civil War.' Towns, vil- 
lages, cities, and States had made contributions for this service to an immense- 
amount, and the people of the Free-labor States, of every political and religious 
creed, were united in efforts to save the life of the Republic. At the same 
time Confederate troops in Virginia, estimated at more than 100,000 in num- 
hei*, occupied an irregular line, from Harper's Ferry, by way of Richmond, to 
Norfolk. Their heaviest force ^vas at Manassas Junction, within about thirty 
miles of Washington City, and there, very soon, the first heavy shock of war 
was felt. 

Congress felt the necessity of bending all its energies to a speedy ending 
of the rebellion. From the beginning of the trouble it was evident that most 
of the foreign governments and the ruling classes of Europe would view with 
satisfaction a Civil War that might destroy the Republic, give a stunning blow 
to Democracy, and thus i-enew their lease of poAver over the people indefinitely. 
Most of the foreign ministers at Washington, regarding the secession move- 
ments in several States as the beginning of a permanent separation, had 
announced [February, 1861] to their respective governments the practical 

' Page 553. 

" Secretary Chase, whose management of the finan- 
cial affairs of the country during a greater portion of the 
period of tlie -war was considered eminently wise and 
efficient, asked for $240,000,000 for war purposes, and 
$80,000, 000 to meet the ordinary demands for the fiscal 
year ending on the 30th of June, 1862. He proposed to 
raise the $80,000,000 in addition to $60,000,000 already 
appropriated, by levying increased duties, and by excise, 
or by the direct taxation of real and personal property. 
To raise the amount for war purposes, he proposed loans, 
to be issued in the form of Treasury notes and bonds, 
or certificates of debt, to be made redeemable at a future 
day, not exceeding thirty years distant. 

Salmon P. Chase was a native of New Hampshire, 
where he was born in 1808. In 1830 he commenced 
the practice of the law in Omciunati, and was one of the 
founders of the "Liberty Party " in Ohio, in 184:1. In 
1849 he was chosen a Senator of the United States, and 
in 1855 was elected Governor of Ohio. Mr. Lincoln 
appointed him Secretary of the Treasury in 1861, and 
afterward Chief Justice, He died May 7, 1873. 




SALMON p. CHASE. 



1861.J LINCOLN'S ADMINISIRATIOX. ^Q^ 

dissolution of the American Union ; and statesmen and publicists abroad 
aflected amazement because of the folly of Congress in legislating concerning 
tariif and other National measures, Avhen the nation was hopelessly expiring ! 
And before the rejiresentative of the new administration (Charles Francis 
Adams) could reach England, the British ministry (already having an agree- 
ment with the Emperor of the French that the two governments should act in 
concert concerning American affairs) procured, in behalf of the disunionists, a 
Proclamation of Neutrality by the Queen [May 13], by which a Confederate 
government, as existing, was acknowledged, and belligerent rights were 
accorded to the insurgents.* Other European governments hastened to give 
the Confederates similar encouragement. Only the Emperor of Russia, of all 
the reigning monarchs, showed sympathy Avith our government in its great 
trouble. Considering this, and the possibility that they might, with equal 
unseemly haste, recognize the independence of the Confederates, and possibly 
lend them material aid. Congress worked diligently in preparations to confront 
the rebellion with ample force. While doing so, that rebellion assumed the 
proportions of Civil War in a sanguinary battle fought so near the capital that 
the sounds of great guns engaged in it were heard there. 

Blood had already been spilled in conflicts on battle-fields. The importance 
of holding possession of Western Virginia, and so the control of the Balti- 
more and Ohio Railway, which connected Maryland and the capital with the 
great West, was apparent to the Confederates. Equally important Avas it for 
them to possess Fortress Monroe, and efforts to seize and hold both were earlv 
made. The strife for Western Virginia began first. The people of that region 
were mostly loyal, and had already taken steps toward a separation from the 
Eastern or rebellious portion of their State. Troops were accordingly seni 
from Richmond to restrain their patriotism. The people rushed to arms, anc' 
under the leadership of Colonel B. F. Kelley, a considerable force was organ 
ized in the vicinity of Wheeling, Avhere, early in May, a mass convention of 
citizens had resolved to sever all connection with the disunionists at Rich- 
mond. A delegate convention was held there on the 13th of May, and made 
provision for a more formal and effective convention on the 11th of June. In 
that body about forty counties were represented, and an ordinance of seces- 
sion from the old Virginia government was adopted. They established a 
provisional government [June 20, 1861], and elected Francis H. Pierpont 
Chief Magistrate. The people ratified their acts in the autumn, and in con- 
vention formed a State Constitution. In June, 1863, West Virginia was 
admitted into the Union as a new State. 

' British sjmpatbr for a rebellion avowedly for the purpose of strengthening and perpetuating 
the institution of slavery, was a strange spectacle. Among the people of the earth, the Enghsh 
• appeared pre-eminently the opposers of slavery. And so, in fact, the great body of the people 
o!' England were. It was the government and the dominant class in that country — the govern- 
ing few as against the governed tnanij — who were thus untrue to principle. The Queen and the 
Prince Consort did not share in the unfriendly feeling toward us. As parents they could not 
forget the exceeding kindness bestowed by our people upon their son, the heir-apparent of the 
throne, who visited this country in 1860 ; and it is known that herMajesty restrained her ministers 
from recognizing the independence of the Confederates, as ttiey were anxious to do. 

26 



562 



THE NATION, 



[188T 




SEAL OF WEST VIKGINIA. 



The government perceived the necessity of affording aid to the Western 
Virginia loyalists, and General George B. McClellan, who had been placed in 
command of the Department of the Ohio, was ordered 
to assist Kelley in driving out the Confederate troops. 
Thus encouraged, the Virginia commander moved on 
Grafton, when the Confederate leader, Porterfield, fled 
to Philippi. Thither he was followed by Kelley, and 
also by Ohio and Indiana troops, under Colonel Du- 
mont. They drove Porterfield from Philippi [June 
3] after a battle (the first after war was proclaimed), 
in which Kelley was wounded, and for a while matters 
were quiet in that region. Grafton was made the 
head-quarters of the National troops in Western Virginia. 

Meanwhile Confederate troops under Colonel Magruder, who had aban- 
doned his flag,' had been moving down the peninsula between the James and 
York Pivers, for the purpose of attempting to seize Fortress Monroe. General 
Butler, in command at the latter post, informed that the insurgents were in a 
fortified camp at Big Bethel, a few miles up the peninsula, resolved to dislodge 
them, for the two-fold purpose of making Fortress Monroe more secure, and 
for carrying out a plan he had conceived of seizing the railway between Suffolk 
and Petersburg, and, menacing the Weldon road which connected Virginia, 
with the Carolinas, draw Confederate troops back from the vicinity of Wash- 
ington. He sent a force under General E, W. Pearce for the purpose, one 
column moving from Fortress Monroe, and the other from Newport-Newce, on 
the James River, Meeting in the gloom before dawn, they fired upon each 
other, alarmed the Confederate outposts, and caused a concentration of all 
the insurgent forces at Big Bethel. There a conflict occurred [June 10, 1861], 
in which Lieutenant J. T, Gi-eble, a gallant young artillery ofiicer, was killed. 
He was the first ofiicer of the regular array who perished in the Civil War. 
The expedition was unsuccessful, and returned to Fortress Monroe. 

The misfortune at Bethel was atoned for the next day [June 11], when Col- 
onel (afterward Major-General) Lewis Wallace, with a few Indiana troops, dis- 
persed five hundred Confederates at Roraney, in Hampshire County, Virginia. 
It was a most gallant feat. Its boldness and success so alarmed the insurgents 
at Harper's Ferry, that they fled to Winchester [June 15], eighteen miles up 
the Shenandoah Valley, and there, under the direction of their accomplished 
commander, Joseph E. Johnston,'' they made preparations for resisting the 
threatened invasion of that region. The evacuation of Harper's Ferry was 
followed by its speedy occupation by National troops. On the day after 



' "Mr. Lincoln," said Magruder to the President, at the middle of April, "everyone else 
may desert you, but / never will." The President thanked him. Two days afterward, having 
done all in his power to corrupt the troops in "Washington, he fled and joined the insurgents. — See 
Greeley's American Conflict, i. 506. 

■■' Johnston was a veteran soldier, and had been a meritorious officer in the National army. He 
had tak-jn command of the Confederates at or near the confluence of the Potomac and Shenan- 
doah RsTers, late in May, and had about 12,000 men under his command. 



1861.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 5g3 

Johnston's flight, General Robert Patterson threw 9,000 men, from the Penn- 
sylvania militia, across the Potomac at Williamsport, but was compelled to • 
recall them in consequence of a requisition from the General-in-Chief to send 
his most efficient troops to Washington, then in peril. On the 2d of July- 
Patterson crossed with about 11,000 troops, and took post at Martinsburg. 
His advance, under General Abercrombie, met, fought, and conquered at Falling 
Waters a considerable force under the afterward famous " Stonewall " Jackson. 

In the mean time stirring events were occurring in Western Virginia. For 
a time it seemed as if Wallace, near Cumberland, must be cut off, and the Bal- 
timore and Ohio Railway pass into the possession of the insurgents. But that 
vigilant officer gallantly maintained his position against great odds, while 
General McClellan, advancing southward from Grafton, was striking the Con- 
federates in the Tygart River region severe blows. Porterfield had' been suc- 
ceeded by General Garnett, whose head-quarters were at Beverly, in Randolph 
County; and the notorious Henry A. Wise,** bearing the commission of a 
Brigadier-General, was with a force in the Valley of the Great Kanawha 
River, where he was confronted by General J. D. Cox. 

McClellan's entire command was composed of about 20,000 troops. A 
portion of these, under General W. S. Rosecrans, fought and conquered a force 
under Colonel Pegram on Rich Mountain, not far from Beverly, on the 11th 
of July. This alarmed Garnett, who, Avith a portion of his force, fled into the 
wild mountain region of the Cheat River, pursued by General T. A. Morris, of 
McClellan's command. Morris overtook Garnett at Carricksford, on a tribu- 
tary of the Cheat River, where a sharp conflict ensued. Garnett was killed 
and his troops were dispersed. Another portion of his followers, who fled from 
Beverly toward Staunton, had been pui-sued to the summit of the Cheat Moun- 
tain range, where an outpost was established under the care of an Indiana 
regiment. General Cox, in the mean time, had driven Wise out of the 
Kanawha Valley, and the war in Western Virginia seemed to be at an end. 
McClellan was called to the command of the Army of the Potomac [July 22], 
as the forces around Washington were designated, and his own troops were 
left in charge of General Rosecrans. 

While these events were occurring beyond the Blue Ridge and the Alle- 
ghany Mountains,^ others of great moment were attracting public attention 
to the National capital and its vicinity. Toward the close of May, it was 
evident that the Confederates were preparing to plant batteries on Arlington 
Heights, which w^ould command Washington City. Robert E. Lee, of Arling- 
ton House,^ an accomplished engineer officer in the army, had lately resigned, 
and had joined the insurgents under circumstances peculiarly painful.* He 

1 Page 562. ' Page 539. 

' These are nearly parallel ranges of mountains which divide Virginia between the Ohio and 
the Atlantic slopes. 

* This was for more than fifty years the residence of the late George Washington Parke 
Custis [see note 1, page 532], who was the father-in-law of Colonel Lee. It overlooked the 
Potomac, Washin.gton City, and Georgetown, and batteries on the range of hills on which it stood, 
called Arlington Heights, would command the National capital completely. 

' Lee was then a heutenant-colonel in the cavalry service, stationed in Texas, and, after the 



564 



THE NATION. 



[1861. 



was now chief of the Vh-giiiia forces, knew the value of batteries on Arling- 
ton Heights, and had, it is believed, been there with engineers from Rich- 
mond. To prevent that jierilous move- 
ment, troops were sent over from 
Washington City [May 24, 1861] to 
take possession of Arlington Heights 
and the city of Alexandria, on the river 
below. The troops for the occupation 
of the Heights crossed the bridges 
from Washington and Georgetown, 
while those sent from Alexandria went 
by water. The NeAv York Fire Zouaves' 
were the first to enter Alexandria, 
Avhere their gallant young commander, 
Colonel Ellsworth, was speedily killed.' 
At the same time, fortifications were 
commenced on Arlington Heights, where 
Fort Corcoran was speedily built by 
an Irish regiment [Sixty-ninth], and named in honor of their commander, 
Colonel Corcoran. This and Fort Runyon, near the Long Bridge, built by 
Xew Jersey troops, were the first regular works erected by the Nationals at 
tlie beginning of the Civil War, and the first over which the flag of the Re- 
jiublic Avas unfurled. A few days later a flotilla of ai-med vessels, under 
Captain Ward, after encountering a battery erected by the insurgents on 
Se well's Point, not far from Norfolk, moved up the Potomac, and at Aquia 
Creek, sixty miles below Washington, had a sharp but unsuccessful engage- 
ment [May 31 and June l] with Confederate batteries constructed there. 




ROBERT E. LEE. 



election of Mr. Lincoln, he was permitted to leave his regiment and return home, when he was 
cordially greeted by General Scott, who loved him as a son, and gave liim his entire confidence. 
In this relation Lee remained, making himself conversant with all the plans and resources of the 
government for the suppression of the rebellion, and at the same time keeping up a continual 
communication with its enemies, until more than a week after the attack on Fort Sumter, and 
six days after the Secessionists at Richmond had promised him the position of commander-in-chief 
of the Virginia forces. Then [April 20] he resigned his command, hastened to Riclimond with 
his important knowledge of affairs at the National capital, joined the Secessionists against his 
government, and speedily rose to the position of general-in-chief of the Confederate army. 

' These composed a regiment under the command of Colonel E. E. Ellsworth, who were imi- 
formed in the picturesque costume of a French corps, first organized in Algiers, and bearing the 
name of Zouave. These were famous in the war on the Crimea [page 526], and their drill, 
adopted by Ellsworth, was exceedingly active. The first Zouave organization in this country wa3 
that of a company at Crawfordsville, Indiana, under Captain (afterwards Major-General) Lewis 
Wallace, in 1860. A few weeks later. Captain Ellsworth organized a company at Chicago. 
There were many Zouave regiments at the beginning of the war, but the gay colors of their cos- 
t'ame made them too conspicuous, and that uniform soon fell into disuse. See next page. 

^ Ellsworth's death, and the circumstances attending it, produced a profound impression. Over 
.in inn in Alexandria, called the Marshall House, the Confederate fiag [page 555] had been flying 
f >r several days, and, immediately after landing at the city, Ellsworth proceeded to remove it. 
] le went to the roof, took it down, and, wliile descending a flight of stairs, the proprietor of the 
inn, waiting for him in a dark passage, shot him dead. The murderer was instantly killed by one 
of Ellsworth's companions. On the day previous to the invasion of Virginia [May 23], William 
McSpeddon, of New York City, and Samuel Smith, of Queen's County, New York, went over from 
Washmgton and captured u Confederate flag. This was the first flag taken from the insurgents. 



1861.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



565 



About a month later [June 27] Captain Ward attacked the Confederates at 
Matthias Point, farther down the Potomac, where liis force was repulsed and 
he was killed. At this place, and in its vicinity, the Confederates established 
batteries that defied the National vessels, and for many months that river, a 
great highway for supplies for the Army of the 
Potomac, was eifectually blockaded by them. 

While these stirring events were occurring east- 
ward of the Alleghanies, others equally important 
were observed in the Mississippi valley. In May 
and June, 186], Civil War was kindling furiously 
wherever the slave-system prevailed, for it Avas 
waged in the interest of that institution. In the 
border Slave-labor States of Kentucky and Mis- 
souri, the contest began early. The governor of 
each (Beriah Magoffin, of Kentucky, and Claiborne 
F. Jackson, of Missouri) was in complicity with 
the Secessionists; and in Kentucky, Simon B. Buck- 
ner, a captain of the National army, who had been 
placed at the head of a military organization 
known as the Kentucky State Guard, was em- 
ployed by them, through its potential means, 
for corrupting the patriotism of the young men 
of that commonwealth. His work was facilitated 

by the leading politicians of that State, who claimed to be Union men, but 
who, at the outset, resolved to withhold all aid to their government in sup- 
pressing the rising rebellion.' They succeeded in placing their State in a 
position of neutrality in the conflict, and the consequence was that it suffered 
terribly from the ravages of war, which might have been averted had the great 
majority of the citizens, who were loyal, been allowed to act in accordance with 
their feelings and judgments. 

In Missouri the loyalists were the majority, but the disloyal governor and 
leading politicians, in their endeavors to unite its destinies Avith the slave- 
holders' Confederation, caused that State, too, to be desolated by war. So 
early as at the close of February [1861], a State convention was held at the 
capital, in which not an openly avowed disunionist appeared. It reassembled 
at St. Louis [March 4], when Sterling Price, a secret enemy to the government, 
but pretending to be its friend, pi-esided. The loyal men gave a loyal tone to 
the proceedings, and the Governor, despairing of using that body for his trea- 




ELLSWORTH ZOUAVE. 



1 The Louisville Journal, the organ of the so-called Unionists of Kentucky, said of the Presi- 
dent's proclamation calling for troops to put down rebellion: "We are struck with mingled 
amazement and indignation. The policy announced in the proclamation deserves the unqualified 
condemnation of everj' American citizen. It is nnworthy, not merely of a statesman, but of a 
man. It is a policy utterly harebrained and ruinous. If Mr. Lincoln contemplated this 
policy in his inaugural address, he is a guilty dissembler; if he conceived it under the excite- 
ment aroused by the seizure of Fort Sumter, he is a guilty Hotspur. In either case he is 
miserably unfit for the exalted position in which the enemies of the country have placed him. 
Let the people instantly take him and his administration into their own hands if they would 
rescue the land from bloodshed, and the Union from sudden and irretrievable destructioii." 



566 



THE NATION. 



[1861. 




ARSENAL AT ST. LOUIS. 



sonable purposes, turned to the more disloyal Legislature for aid. The latter 
yielded to his -wishes, and, under the inspiration of Daniel M, Frost, a native 
of New York, and a graduate of the Military Academy at West Point, they 
made arrangements for enrolling the militia of the State, and placing in the 
hands of the governor a strong military force, to be used against the power 
of the National government. Arrangements were also made for seizing the 

National Arsenal at St. 
Louis, and holding pos- 
session of that chief city 
HM'i IF llfflHIII IB fWIIIHI^^^-iin^^^**^''^TBiMhi ofthe Mississippi valley. 

For this purpose, and 
with the pretext of dis- 
ciplining the militia of 
that district. Frost, com- 
missioned a brigadier- 
general by the Gover- 
nor, formed a camp near 
the city. But the plan was frustrated by the vigilant loyalists of St. Louis 
and Captain Nathaniel Lyon, commanding the military post there. When it 
became evident that Frost was about to seize the arsenal, Lyon, with a large 
number of volunteers, surrounded the rebel's camp, and made him and his 
followers prisoners. 

The government and the authorities of Missouri now took open issue. Sat- 
isfied that the Secessiouists had resolved to secure to their interest that State 
and Kentucky, the National authorities took possession of and fortified Cairo, 
Sit the junction of the Oh'o and Mississippi rivers, and of Bird's Point, a low 
blufl' opposite, on the Missouri side of the " Father of Waters." It was a 
timely movement, for Governor Jackson' 
speedily called [June 12, 1861] into the 
service of the State of Missouri fifty thou- 
sand of the militia, "for the purpose of 
repelling invasion," et cetera, and at Jefier- 
Bon City, the capital of the common- 
wealth, he raised the standard of revolt, 
with Sterling Price' as military commander. 
At the same time the authorities of Tennes- 
see, who, led by the disloyal Governor, 
Isham G. Harris, had placed that State in 
a military relation to the Confederacy simi- 
lar to that of Virginia,' were working in 
^harmony with Jackson, their troops being sterlino price. 

under the command of General Gideon J. 

Pillow. That officer was making earnest efibrts for the seizure of Cairo, when, 
early in July, Leonidas Polk, Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church of 




Page 565. 



1861.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 55^ 

the Diocese of Louisiana, and a graduate of West Point Academy, succeeded 
liim in command. Meanwhile, Lyon, who had been promoted to Major-General, 
and placed in command of the Department of Missouri, moved a strong force 
against the insurgents at the State capital. With 2,000 men he went up the 
Missouri River in two steamers. When he approached Jefferson City the 
insurgents fled. He hotly pursued, and overtook, fought, and dispersed them 
near Booneville, The vanquished Missourians again fled, and halted not until 
they had reached the southwestern borders of the State. Lyon now held 
military control of the most important portions of it.' 

There was now great commotion all over the land. War had begun in 
earnest. Confederate pirate-ships were depredating upon the ocean. ^The 
fife and drum were heard in every hamlet, village, and city, from the St. 
Croix to the Rio Grande. Compromises and concessions seemed no longer 
possible. The soothing lullaby of the last "Peace Convention"* was lost in 
the din of warlike preparations, and it was evident that the great question 
before the people, whether the retrogressive influence of slave institutions or 
the progressive civilization of free institutions should prevail in the Republic, 
could only be settled by the arbitrament of the sword, to which the friends of 
the former and the enemies of the Union had appealed. A mighty army of 
defenders of the Republic was rapidly gathering and earnestly drilling at its 
capital, and was animated by an intense desire (shared by the loyal people) to 
go forward, disperse the army of the conspirators, and drive their chief and 
his counselors from Richmond, where, with great energy, they were devising 
and putting into execution plans for the overthrow of their government. The 
gratification of that desire was promised when, at the middle of July, the 
General-in-Chief gave orders for the movement of the army upon the foe at 
JManassas, then commanded by Beauregard.* 

Lieutenant-General Scott was too feeble to take command of the army in 
the fi.eld,* and that duty was assigned to General Irwin McDowell, then at the 
head of the Department of Virginia. Already Ohio and South Carolina troopa 



* He so held the whole region north of the Missouri River, and east of a hne running south 
from Booneville on that stream to the Arkansas border, thus giving the government the control 
of the important points of St. Louis, Hannibal, St. Joseph, and Bird's Point, as bases of opera- 
tions, with railways and rivers for transportation. 

* The VirginiaSecessionistsrepeated the trick of a "Peace Convention" [see page 549] on a 
more limited scale after they had dragged their State into the Confederation. They proposed a 
convention of delegates from the border Slave-labor States, to be held in Frankfort, Kentucky. 
The 27th of May was appointed as the day for their assembling. There were present no dele- 
gates from Virginia, and only five beside those appointed in Kentucky. Those present professed 
to be eminently "neutral," and talked of "wrongs endured by the South," and the "sectional- 
ism o-f the North," and regarded the preservation and National protection of the slave-system as 
"essential to the best hopes of our country." The trick was too apparent to deceive anybody, 
and had no effect. It was the last " peace conference " of its kind. 

^ Page 553. On taking command of that army, at the beginning of June, Beauregard, who 
was noted throughout the war for his official misrepresentations, ludicrous boastings, and signal 
failures as a military leader, issued a proclamation so infamous and shameless, considering tho 
conduct of himself and his superiors at Richmond, that honorable Confederate leaders like John- 
ston, Ewell, and Longstreet blushed for shame. 

* He was afflicted with dropsy and vertigo, and for four months previously he had not beea 
'ile to moimt a horse. 



568 



THE NATION. 



[18G1. 




WINFIELD SCOTT IN ]f 



had measuretl sti-enfjth at Vienna, a few miles from Washington, in an 
encounter [June iVth] concerning the possession of the railway between 

Alexandria and Leesburg ;' and now the 
National army was eager to repeat the 
contest on a larger scale. The opportunity 
speedily offered. A little more than 
30,000 troops moved from Arlington 
Heights and vicinity^ toward Manassas 
at the middle of July, and on the ISth 
a portion of these, under General Tyler,. 
had a severe battle at Blackburn's Ford, on 
]>uirs Run, not far from Centreville, in 
Fairfax County. The Nationals were re- 
pulsed and saddened, and the Confederates 
were highly elated. The loss of men 
was about equally divided between the 
combatants, being about sixty on each side. 

McDowell's plan was to turn the right flank of the Confederates, and com- 
pel both Beauregard and Johnston to fall back ; and Tyler's movement near 
Blackburn's Ford was intended as a feint, but ended in a battle. The result 
of that engagement, and his observations during a reconnoissance on the fol- 
lowing day [July 20], satisfied McDowell that his plan w^as not feasible. lie 
therefore resolved to make a direct attack on the foe. It Avas important that 
it should be done speedily, because the terms of enlistment of his " three 
months men "^ were about to expire, and Patterson, yet at Martinsburg, was 
in a position to give him instant assistance, if necessary. The latter had been 
ordered to so menace Johnston as to keep him at Winchester , and prevent his 
re-enforcmg Beauregard, or to go to the support of McDowell, if necessary. 
Such being the situation, the commander of the Nationals felt confident of 
success, and at two o'clock on Sunday morning, the 21st of July [1861], he set 
his army in motion in three columns — one under General Tyler, marching to 
menace the Confederate left at the Stone Bridge over Bull's Run, on the War- 
ranton road, while two others, under Generals Hunter and Heintzelman, taking^ 
a wide circuit more to the left, were to cross the stream at different points, and 



' The National troops were commanded by Colonel A. McD. McCook, who had been sent out 
to picket and guard the road. They were accompanied on this occasion by General Robert C. 
Scheuck. The Confederates were in charge of Colonel Maxcy Gregg, who had been a leading 
member of the South Carolina Secession Convention. 

'•^ At this time the main body of McDowell's troops, about 45.000 strong, occupied a line, with 
the Potomac at its back, extending from Alexandria, nine miles below Washington, almost to the 
Chain Bridge, six miles above the capital. The remainder of the National arm.y, about 18,000 
strong, was at or near Martinsburg, under General Patterson. Both armies were liable to a sud- 
den decrease, for the terms of enhstraent of the "three months men" were about expinng. 
The main Confederate army, under Beauregard, was at and near Manassas Junction, in a very 
strong defensive position, about half way between the more eastern range of the Blue Ridge and 
the Potomac at Alexandria. Jolmston's force at Winchester was larger than Patter.son's, and 
was in a position to re-enforce Beauregard without much difficulty. He made his position quite 
Btrong, by casting up earthworks for defense. 

= See page 485. ■• Page 551. 



L I X C LN ' S ADMINISTRATION, 



569 



make the real attack on Beauregarcrs left wing, menaced by Tyler. At the same 
time troops under Colonels Richai-dson and Davies were to march from near 
Centreville, and threaten the Confederate right.^ These movements Avere duly 
executed, but with some mischievous delay, and it was well toward noon 
before the battle was 
fairly begun. 

Beauregard had 
planned an attack on 
McDowell at Centre- 
ville, the same morn- 
ing. The authori- 
ties at Richmond, 
informed of the lat- 
ter's movements, had 
ordered Johnston to 
hasten to the aid of 
Beauregard, who was 
now compelled to act 
on tlie defensive. Af- 
ter several hours' 
hard fighting, with 
varying fortunes on 
both sides, and the 
mutual losses dread- 
ful, the Nationals, 
with superior numbers, were on the point of gaining a complete victory, when 
from the Shenandoah Valley came six thousand of Johnston's fresh troops, and 
turned the tide of battle. Johnston had managed to elude Patterson, and had 
hastened to Manassas, followed by his troops, and there, as senior in rank, he 
took the chief command. Patterson, awaiting promised information and 
orders from the General-in-Cliief (which he did not receive), failed to re-enforce 
McDowell, and when, at about three o'clock in the afternoon, Johnston's troops 
swelled the ranks of Beauregard to a volume greater than those of his foes, 
the Nationals were throMU back in confusion, and fled in disastrous rout 
toward Washington City.'^ Jefferson Davis had just arrived on the battle- 
field when the flight began. He sent an exultant shout by telegraph to his 




RUINS OF THE STOXE BRIDGE. 



' The Confederate army lay along a line nearly parallel to the general course of Bull's Run, 
from Union Mills, where the Orange and Alexandria railway crosses that stream, to the passage 
of the Warrenton turnpike, at the Stone Bridge several miles above. 

" A large number of civilians saw the smoke of battle from Centreville and its vicinity. Sev- 
eral members of Congress, and many others, went out from Washington to see the fight, as they 
would a holiday spectacle, not doubting the success of the National troops. These were seen flying 
back in the greatest terror, while Congressman Alfred Elv, and one or two other civilians, were 
captured, and held as prisoners in Richmond for several months. Among tlie fugitives was W. 
H. Russell, correspondent of the London Times, who, notwithstanding he had not seen the battle, 
wrote an account of it the same night, while in an >mfit condition, as he acknowledged, to writ» 
any thing truthfully. It was very disparaging to the Nationals, and filled the enemies of the 
Repubhc in Europe with joy, because of the assurance it gave of the success of the disunionists 



570 'THB NATION. [1861 

fellow-Secessionists at Richmond,' and the whole Confederacy speedily rang 
with its echoes ; while the remnant of the vanquished army hastened back in 
fragments to the defenses of Washington, and the gloom of deepest despond- 
ency overshadowed the loyal heart of the nation for a moment. While one 
section of the Republic was resonant with sounds of exultation, the other was 
gilent and cast down for a moment. 

The extraordinary session of Congress' had not yet closed, when the disas- 
ter at Bull's Run occurred. That event did not disturb the composure or the 
faith of that body. Fi-iends of the Confederates who yet lingered in the 
National Legislature Avere using every means in their power to thwart legisla- 
tion that looked to the crushing of the rebellion f but the patriotic majority 
went steadily forward in their efforts to save the Republic. When the battle 
occurred, they had under consideration a declaratory resolution concerning the 
object of the war on the part of the government, and while the capital was 
filled with fugitives from the shattered National army, and it was believed by 
many that the seat of government was at the mercy of its enemies. Congress 
deliberated as calmly as if assured of perfect safety, adopted the Declaratory 
Resolution,^ and made thorough provisions for prosecuting the war vigorously. 
The same faith and patriotic action were soon visible among the loyal people. 
Their despondency was momentary. Almost immediately they recovered from 
the stunning blow to their hopes and desires. They awakened from the 
delusive and dangerous di-eam that their armies Avere absolutely invincible. 
There was at once another wonderful uprising of the Unionists, and while the 
Confederates wei*e wasting golden moments of opportunity in celebrating their 
victory, thousands of young men were seen flocking toward the National capi- 
tal to join the great Army of Defense. Within a fortnight after the battle 
just recorded, when the terms of service of the " three months men " had 



' From Manassas Junction he telegraphed, saying: — "Night has closed upon a hard-fought 
field. Our forces were victorious. The enemy was routed, and fled precipitately, abandoning a 
large amount of arms, ammunition, knapsacks, and baggage. The ground was strewn for miles 
with those killed, and the farm-houses and the grounds around were filled with the wounded." 
"Our force," he said, " was 15,000 ; that of the enemy estimated at 30,000." This was not only 
an exaggeration, but a misrepresentation. From the most reliable authorities on both sides, it 
appears that, in the final struggle, the Nationals liad about 13,000 men, and the Confederates 
about 27,000. The latter had been receiving re-enforcements all day, while not a man crossed 
Bull's Run after twelve o'clock at noon to re-enforce the Nationals. 

" Page 560. 

' Page 549. Slidell, Yulee, and other Senators, remained for some time, for the avowed pur- 
pose of preventing legislation that might strengthen the hands of the government. 

* J. J. Crittenden offered the following joint resolution : — " That the present deplorable Civil 
War has been forced upon the country by the disunionists of the Southern States now in revolt 
against the constitutional government, and in arms around the capital; that in this National 
emergency Congress, banisliiug all feeling of mere passion or resentment, will recollect only its 
duty to its country ; that this war is not waged on our part in any spirit of oppression, not for 
any purpose of conquest or subjugation, nor purpose of overthrowing or interfering with the 
rights or established usages of those States; but to defend and maintain the supremacy of the 
Constitution, and to preserve the Union, with all the dignity, equality, and rights of the several 
States unimpaired; and as soon as these objects are accomplished, the war ought to cease." 

This resolution was adopted by an almost unanimous vote in both Houses of Congress. It 
alarmed the disunionists, for it positively denied those false allegations with which they had 
deceived the people. They were so fearful that their dupes might see it and abandon their bad 
cause, that no newspaper in the Confederacy, it is said, was allowed to publish the fact. 



1861.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 571 

expired, more than an equal number of volunteers were in the camp or in the 
field, engaged for " three years or the war," Nine-tenths of the non-com- 
batants shared in the faith and fervor of those who took up arms, and the 
people of the Free-labor States presented a spectacle difficult to comprehend. 
That terrible crisis in the life of the nation was promptly met, and the salva- 
tion of the Republic was assured. At the same time that "United South" 
against the government, which the Secessionists had loudly proclaimed months 
before, now became a reality. The prestige of victory, the pressure of a ter- 
rible despotism, and the menaces of banishment and confiscation acts, passed 
by the Confederate " Congress," together with the prospect of the establish- 
ment of a new nation, suddenly carved by the sword out of the Republic, with 
whose fortunes it seemed their duty and interest to link themselves, so afiected 
the great body of the Unionists at the South, that they yielded to necessity, 
and the voice of opposition was speedily hushed into silence.' 

On the day after the Battle of Bull's Run [July 22, 1861], General McClel- 
lan, whose troops had been successful in Western Virginia,'^ was called to the 
command of the army at Washington. He at once set about the reorganiza- 
tion of that broken force with skill and industry. It was perfected by the 
middle of October, when seventy-five thousand well-armed' and fairly disci- 
plined troops were in a condition to be placed in active service in the field. 
McClellan's moral power was then tremendous. He had the confidence of the 
army and the whole country, and he was called a " Young Napoleon." And 
when, on the 1st of November, General Scott resigned his position, and on his 
recommendation his place as General-in-Chief was filled by the appointment 
of McClellan,* that act was hailed as a promise of a speedy termination of the 
rebellion, for he had said that the war should be " short, sharp, and decisive." 
He spent the remainder of the autumn, and the whole winter, in making 
preparations for a campaign for the capture of Richmond ; and when, at the 
beginning of March, his force, which was called the Grand Army of the 
Potomac, was put in motion, it numbered 220,000 men.^ In the mean time, 

' The pressure brought to bear on the Union men was terrible, and the youth of that class 
were driven into the army by thousands, because of the social proscription to which they were 
subjected. The zeal of the women in the cause of rebellion was unbounded, and their influence 
was extremely potential. Young men who hesitated when asked to enlist, or even waited to be 
asked, were shunned and sneered at by the young women ; and many were the articles of women's 
apparel which were sent, as significant gifts, to these laggards at home. Men who still dared to 
stand firm in their true allegiance were denounced as "traitors to their country," and treated as 
such. 

* Page 563. 

' We have observed [page 549] that Secretary Floyd, in preparation for the rebellion, had 
stripped the arsenals and armories of the Free-labor States, and filled those of the Slave-labor 
States. It was necessary for the government to send to Europe for arms. For that purpose 
Colonel George L. Schuyler, of General Wool's staff, was dispatched [July, 1861], and he pur- 
chased 116,000 rifles, 10,000 revolvers, 10,000 cavalry carbines, and 21,000 sabers, at an 
aggregate cost of little over $2,000,000. Impediments were at first cast in the way of his 
purchase of arms in England and France, the sympathy of those governments being with the 
conspirators. He purchased the greater portion of them in Vienna and Dresden. 

* See General Orders, Xo. 94, November 1, 18G1. 

' Of this number, about thirty thousand were sick or absent. Among the latter class were 
several hundred prisoners captured at Bull's Run and Ball's BlulY, on the Upper Potomac. The 
prison-life of captives among the Confederates was often very terrible. 



572 



THE NATION. 



[1861. 



the Confederate army, under Johnston, lying between Washington City and 
Richmond, not more than 40,000 strong at any time, had remained undisturbed, 
and Washington City had been made impregnable by the erection around it 
of no less than tifty-two forts and redoubts. 

While the process of reorganizing the Army of the Potomac was going on, 
the war was making rapid progress west of the Alleghanies, and especially in 
Missouri. We left General Lyon, victorious, at Booueville,' and the fugitive 




insuigent«!, under 
Puce and Jack- 
son, ni the 'Nouth- 
Avestcrn part of the State. 
While Lyon was pursu- 
ing the main body of 
the i]isurgents, another 
Union force, under Colo- 
nel Franz Sigel, an ac- 
complished German sol- 
dier, was pushing for- 
ward from St. Louis, 
by way of Rolla. When he heard of the flight of the insurgents toward 
the borders of Arkansas, he pressed on in that direction, passing through 
Springfield and Sarcoxie, and near Carthage he fell in with the main 
body of the Confederates, much superior to him in numbers, and espe- 
cially in horsemen. Sigel had more cannon than his foe, but, in a sharp 
engagement that ensued [July 5, 1861], the overwhelming force of the insur- 
gents pushed him back, and he retreated in good order to Springfield. To 



rORTlFICATIONS IN AND AROUND WASinNGTON CITY. 



Page 567. 



1861.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 5^3 

that point Lyon liastened wlieu lie lieard of the apparent peril that threatened 
Sigel, and on the 13th lie took command of the nnited forces. Meanwhile the 
insurgent Missourians had been largely re-enforced by troops from Texas and 
Arkansas, and at the close of July the combined force, about 20,000 strong (a 
iarge proportion cavalry), under Generals Price, Ben McCuUoch, Pearce, Rains, 
and INIcBride, "were marching on S})ringtield. Lyon's force did not exceed 
0,000 men (400 cavalry) and eighteen cannon. 

Feeble as he was, Lyon went out to meet the advancing foe. In a beauti- 
ful valley, at a place called Dug Springs, nineteen miles from Springfield, he 
met, fought, and A'anquished his enemies, under McCulloch and Rains. So 
desperate Avere the charges of a few of Lyon's cavalry, under Stanley, that 
Confederate prisoners inquired: "Are they men or devils?" Lyon returned 
to Springfield [August 4], and a few days latei' [August 9] the Confederate 
army, under the general command of McCulloch, wearied and half-starved, 
encamped at Wilson's Creek, about ten miles south of the town. Lyon again 
went out to meet them, marching his little force in two columns, before dawn 
the next morning [August 10]; one led by- himself, to attack their front, and 
the other by Sigel, to fall upon their rear. A battle opened at an early lioui*. 
The brunt of it fell upon Lyon's column, for Sigel's, deceived by a trick,' was 
early dis2:)ersed or captured. Lyon's troops, inspired by their leader, fought 
jxreat odds with vigor and gallantry. The commander was everywhere seen, 
encouraging his men, until at about nine o'clock in the morning he fell mor- 
tally wounded, and was succeeded in command by Major Sturgis, The battle 
ceased at eleven o'clock, when the Nationals were victorious. It was not safe 
f )r them to remain on the field of victor}^ nor to risk another encounter, so, on 
the following morning [July 11], the Avhole Union force, led by Sigel, retreated 
in good order toward Rolla, safely conducting to that place a government 
train valued at a million and a half dollars. 

The loyal civil authorities of Missouri were now striving against powerful 
influences to keep the State from the vortex of secession. The j^opular conven- 
tion,'^ which reassembled at Jeflferson City on the 22d of July, declared fhe 
government of which the traitor Jackson was the head to be illegal, and 
organized a provisional government for service until a permanent one should 
be formed by the people. Meanwhile, Reynolds, Jackson's lieutenant-governor, 
issued a proclamation at New Madrid, as acting chief magistrate, in which he 
declared the State to be separated from the Union, and that, by " invitation of 
Governor Jackson," General Pillow had entered Missouri at the head of Ten- 
nessee troops, to act in conjunction Avith M. Jeff. Thompson, a native leader, 
in xipholding the secession movement. Jackson was then in Richmond, nego- 

' Sigel's force was composed of twelve hundred men and six guns. He marched so stealthily 
tliat the first intimation the Confederates had of his presence was the bursting of the shells 
from his guns over Rains's camp. ' The Confederates fled, and Sigel took possession of their 
l>osition, when it was reported that some of Lyon's column were approaching. When these, 
dressed like Sigel's men (they were Confederates in disguise), were within less than musket-shot 
distance of the latter, they opened a destructive fire upon tlie Unionists with cannon and small 
arms, spreading consternation in his ranks. He lost all but about three hundred men and one 
tield-piece. '^ Page 5G5. 



574 THE KATION. [1861. 

tijiting witli the ''government" for the finnexation of Missouri to the Con- 
federacy ; and the vain and shallow Pillow' assumed the pompous title of 
"Liberator of Missouri,'' dating his orders and. dispatches, ''Head-Quarters 
Army of Liberation." Although the conditions of annexation were not com- 
plied with, men claiming to represent Missouri performed tlie farce of occu- 
pying seats in the so-called "Congress" of the Confederates at Kichmond 
during a greater portion of the war. 

At this critical juncture, John C. Fremont,'^ wlio had lately returned from 
Europe with some arras for his government, and bearing the commission of 
Major-General, was appointed to the command of the Western Department, 
with his head-quarters at St. Louis. He found every thing in confusion, and 
much that Avas needed for the public service. He went vigorously at work in 
the important duty assigned him. He fortified St. Louis, and took measures 
for making the important posts of Cairo and Bird's Point^ absolutely secure, 
for these were menaced by Pillow and his associates. These measures alarmed 
the disloyal inhabitants and the invading troops, but when the retreat of the 
Nationals from Springfield and the death of Lyon" became known, the seces- 
sionists assumed a bold and defiant attitude. They gathered in armed bands 
throughout the State. The civil authority was helpless ; so Fremont, seeing 
no other way to secure the supremacy of the National government than by 
taking the Avhole power in his department into his own hands, declared mar- 
tial law [August 31, 1861], and warned the disaffected that' it would be 
rigorously executed. He acted promptly in accordance with his declaration, 
and the insurgents began to quail, when his vigor was checked by his govern- 
ment.' 

Soon after the battle at Wilson's Creek, Price was abandoned by McCul- 
loch, with whom he could not agree, wh«n he called upon the Missouri seces- 
sionists to fill his ranks, and early in September he was moving with a con- 
siderable force northward tow^ard the Missouri River, in the direction of 
Lexington, where nearly three thousand National troops were collected, under 
Colonel J. A. Mulligan. Colonel Jetferson C. Davis was then at Jefferson City 
with a larger force, and General John Pope was hastening in the direction of 
Lexington from the region northward of the Missouri, with about five thousand 
men. Price, aware of danger near, pressed forward and laid siege to Lexington 
on the 1 1th of September. Mulligan had cast up some intrenchments there, but 
his men had only about forty rounds of ammunition each, and his heavy arma- 
ment consisted of six small cannon and two howitzei's — the latter useless, 
because he had no shells. Price had an overwhelming force, and opened fire 
on the 12th. Re-enforcements came to him, and the insurgents finally numbered 

' Page 5G6. " Pages 488 and 530. ' Page 566. ■" Page 573. 

* In his proclamation of martial law, Fremont declared that whoever should be found guilty 
of thereafter taking an active part with the enemies of the government in the field, should suffer 
the penalty of confiscation of their property to the public use, and have their slaves, if they pos- 
sessed any, made forever freemen. This raised a storm of indignation among the so-called 
Unionists of the Border Slave-labor States, whose pood-will the government was then trying to 
secure, and that efficient measure against the rebellion, which, two years later, the government 
itself used, Fremont was then forbidden to employ. 



1861.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 5^5 

about twenty-five thousand men. Mulligan and his little band made a gallant 
defense until the morning of the 20th [September, 1861], when he was compelled 
to surrender.' Pie had held out with hopes of success, but when re-enforce- 
ments approached it was too late for them to penetrate to his lines. This 
disaster was severely felt, and on the 27th of September Fremont put in motion 
an army of more than twenty thousand men for the purpose of retrieving it,, 
and driving Price and his insurgents out of the State. 

"While these events were occurring in the heart of Missouri, important ones 
were taking place in Kentucky. Governor Magoffin'' encouraged the seces- 
sionists as much as he dared. He allowed them to establish recruiting camps 
for the Confederate army ; and when the loyal Legislature of the State assem- 
bled [September 2] he and his political associates, fearing the adverse action 
of that body, looked with complacency upon the invasion of the State, and the 
seizure of the strong position of Columbus [September 6], on the Mississippi, 
by Confederate troops under General (Bishop) Polk. In defiance of their 
avowed respect for the neutrality of Kentucky, the ''government " at Richmond 
sanctioned the movement,^ and thus opened the way for the horrors of war, 
which filled Kentucky with distress. Columbus was held by the Confederates. 
The Legislature requested the Governor to call out the militia of the State " ta 
expel and drive out the invaders," and asked the General Government to aid in 
the work. The Governor resisted, but was compelled to yield. General An- 
derson,* in command there, at once prepared to act vigorously, and General 
Ulysses S. Grant, then in command in the district around Cairo, took military 
possession of Paducah, at the mouth of the Tennessee River. Thus ended the 
" neutrality " of Kentucky, which proved so disastrous to that State, Too late 
to avoid the consequences of that folly, the State now took a positive stand for 
the Union, and avoided many evils, 

Felix K, Zollicofier, formerly a member of Congress, invaded Kentucky 
from East Tennessee (where the Unionists were terribly persecuted)^ on the 

' The private soldiers were paroled and the officers were held as prisoners of war. Mulligan 
lost 40 killed and 120 wounded. Price's loss was 25 killed and 75 wounded. The spoils were 6 
cannon, 2 howitzers, 3,000 stand of small arms, 750 horses, a large quantity of equipage, and 
commissary stores valued at $100,000. ^ Page 565. 

' Some of tlie partisans of Davis, South and North, denied that he ever sanctioned this viola- 
tion of the pledged faith of the Confederates to respect the neutrality of Kentucky, The proof 
that he did so is undeniable. His so-called Secretary of War, as a cover to the iniquity, tele- 
graphed publicly to Polk, directing him to withdraw his troops from Kentucky soil. At the same 
time, Davis himself, with supreme power, telegraphed privately to Polk, saying: "The necessity 
must justify the act." For the proof, see Lossing's Pictorial Hisiiwy of the Civil War, II. 75 

* The defender of Fort Sumter [page 550] had been promoted to brigadier, and was then in 
command in Kentucky. 

' Jefferson Davis was quick to act upon tlie authority given Lira by the confiscation and ban- 
ishment acts of his " Congress." In districts such as East Tennessee, and other mountain regions, 
where the blight of slavery was httle known, the people were generally loyal to their government. 
When the Confederates held sway in such districts, tlie keenest cruelties were practiced upon the 
Union inhabitants. East Tennesseans were peculiar sufferers on that account through a greater 
portion of the war. Loyalists were hunted, not only by armed men, but by bloodhounds, with 
which fugitive slaves were pursued.* They were taken to military camps, abused by mobs, 

* In the Memphis Appeal appeared an advertisement, in the autumn of ISGl, for "fifty well-bred'' and "one 
pair of thoroughbred bloodhounds, that will take the track of a man. The purpose," said the advertisement, "for 
which these doss are wanted, is to chase the infernal, cowardly Lincoln bushwhackers [Unionists] of East Ten- 
nessee and Kentucky to their haunts, and capture them." Thi« was signed by F. N. McNairy and H. H. HarrU, 
Confederate officers in camp. 



5^(J THK NATION [1861. 

day after Polk seized Columbus,' and Buckner, already mentioned as the cor- 
rupter of the patriotism of the young men of that State,* who had established 
a camp in Tennessee just below the Kentucky border, acting in co-operation 
with the two invaders, attempted to seize Loidsville, but Avas foiled by the 
\ igilance of Anderson and the troops under him, Buckner advanced as far as 
Elizabethtown, but was compelled to fall back to Bowling Gi*een, on the Nash- 
ville and Louisville railway, where he established an intrenched camp, and 
made it the nucleus of a powerful force gathered there soon afterward. 

Let us turn again for a moment to the consideration of affairs in Missouri. 

AYe have observed that Fremont set a heavy force in motion to drive the 
Confederates out of Missouri. Ileliad formed a general plan for driving them 
out of the Mississippi Valley, and re-opening the navigation of the great 
stream which the insurgents had obstructed by batteries.^ It was to capture 
or disperse the forces under Price, and seize Little Rock, the capital of Arkansas, 
and so completely turn the jjosition of the forces under Pillow and others, as 
to cut off their supi^lies from that region and compel them to retreat, M'hen a 
flotilla of gun-boats, then in j^reparation near St. Louis, could easily descend 
the river and assist in military operations against Memphis. If the latter 
should be successful, the army and navy might push on and take possession of 
New Orleans. Fremont accompanied his army in the initial movement of his 
plan, namely, against Price, and on the 11th of October, when well on his way 
toward Arkansas, his forces marching in five columns,'* he wrote: — "My plan 
is New Orleans straight. I would precipitate the war forward, and end it 
soon and victorioiisly." But he was not allowed to carry out his i^lan, and at 
Springfield, Avhere his body-guard, under Zagonyi, had made one of the most 
memorable charges on record upon the strong foe,^ he was superseded in com- 
mand "by General David Hunter, and the army, instead of going forward, 
marched sadly back toward St. Louis at the middle of November. Meanwhile 
detachments of Fremont's army, under various leaders, had been doing gallant 
service against bands of insurgents in various parts of Missouri, the most nota- 
ble of Avhich were contests with M. Jefl^. Thompson and his guerrillas, in the 
eastern part of the State, who were defeated and disjiersed in October, chiefly 
by Missouri, Illinois, and Indiana troops. 

thrust into prisons, and some were hanged for no other crime than active loyalty to their govern- 
ment. Among the most notable of these sufferers in East Tennessee was Rev. Dr, Brownlow, a 
leading citizen, who had been a poHtical editor at Knoxville for many years, was very influential 
us a citizen, and was feared and hated hy the Confederates. His sufferings, and those of his 
fellow-patriots, form tlie subject of a volume from his pen, of great interest. At the close of the 
war he was elected Governor of the State (having been appointed Provisional Governor), and in 
1867 he was re-elected by an immense majority of tlie legal voters of Tennessee. 

* Page 575. * Page 565. 

* So early as the 12th of January, 1861, three days after a convention of politicians in Missis- 
sippi had declared that State severed from the Union, Governor Pettus directed a battery to be 
planted at Yicksburg, with orders to hail and examine every vessel that should attempt to pass. 
Other batteries were soon planted there and upon other bluffs m the river, and for more than two 
years the commerce of the Mississippi was suspended. 

* Commanded respectively by Generals David Hunter, John Pope, Franz Sigel, J. McKmstry, 
and A Ashboth. 

^ Zagonyi charged upon nearly two thousand infantry and cavalry with one hundred and fifty 
of his men, routed the foe, and came out of the conflict with eighty-four of his little band dead 
or wounded. 



1861.J 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



577 



Before being deprived of Lis command, Fremont, in 2:)ursuance of his plan, 
directed General Grant to make a co-operative movement on the line of the 
Mississippi River. Grant determined to threaten Columbus' by attacking 
Belmont, on the Missouri shore opposite, to prevent Polk assisting Thompson. 
With about 3,000 troops (mostly Illinois volunteers, under General John A. Mc- 
Clernand), in transports, accompanied by the wooden gun-boats Tyler and Lex- 
ington^ he went down the Mississippi from Cairo, Avhile another force Avas march- 
ing from Paducah^ toward the rear of Columbus, under General Charles F. Smith, 
to divert Polk's attention from the river expedition. That expedition suddenly 
nnd unexpectedly appeared just above Columbus on the morning of the 7th 
of Xoveraber, when the gun-boats opened 
fn-e on Polk's batteries. The troops were 
landed on the Missouri shore, three miles 
above Belmont, and immediately marched 
upon that place. Polk sent over troops 
under General Pillow to re-enforce the 
garrison there. A sharp engagement en- 
sued, and the Nationals were victorious, 
but the ground being commanded by the 
batteries on the bluffs at Columbus, it 
was untenable, and Grant withdrew. 
Polk determined not to allow him to 
escape. He opened upon the retiring 
troops some of his heaviest guns, sent 
Cheatham to re-enforce Pillow, and then 

led over two regiments himself to swell the ranks of the pursuers. Grant 
fougbt his way back to his transports after suffering severely,' and re-embarked 
under cover of the gun-boats and escaped. The battle was gallantly fought 
on both sides, and many deeds of daring are recorded. 

Zollicoffer's invasion^ aroused the Unionists of Eastern Kentucky, and they 
flew to arms under various leaders. In a picturesque region of the Cumber- 
land Mountains, known as the Pock Castle Hills, they fought and repulsed 
him. Still flirther eastward in Kentucky, loyalists under General William 
Nelson fought and dispersed a Confederate force under Colonel J. S. Williams, 
near Piketon. The latter fled to the mountains at Pound Gap, carrying away 
a large number of cattle. These successes inspired the East Tennessee loyal- 
ists with hopes of a speedy deliverance, but they were compelled to wait long 
for that consummation. The Confederates, toward the close of 1861, had 
obtained a firm foothold in Tennessee, and occupied a considerable portion of 
Southern Kentucky, from the mountains to the Mississippi River, along a line 
about four hundred miles in length. At the same time the Nationals were 
preparing to drive them southward. Let us now consider events in the 
vicinity and eastward of the Alleghany Mountains, and along the sea-coast. 




LEONIDAS POLK. 



Page 575. » Page 575. 

Grant lost in killed, wounded, and missing, 485 men, and Polk 632. ■• Page 575. 

37 



578 '^^^^^ NATION. [1861. 

Ill tlio .autumn of 18G1 tlie Confederates struggled severely for the posses- 
sion of Western Virginia. General Robert E, Lee had been sent to take com- 
mand of tlie troops left by Garnett and Pegram in Northern Virginia.' He 
made liis liead-quarters at ITnntersville, in Pocahontas County, and early in 
August [1801] he found himself at the head of about 16,000 troops. Floyd, 
the late Secretary of War,'' had been commissioned a brigadier-general, and 
sent to the region of the Gaulcy Kivcr, with troops to re-enforce the incompe- 
tent Wise, and to take chief command. Floyd was expected to sweep down 
the Kanawha Valley, and drive General Cox across the Ohio, while Lee should 
scatter or capture the National forces under General Rosecrans in Northern 
Virginia, and open a way into Ohio, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Pi'ej^ara- 
tory to these decisive movements, Floyd took position between Cox and Rose- 
crans at Carnifcx Ferry, on the Gauley River, a few miles from Summersville, 
the capital of Nicholas County, leaving Wise to watch the region nearer the 
junction of the Gauley and New River, which form the Kanawha. 

Rosecrans had organized an army of nearly 10,000 men at Clarksburg, on 
the Baltimore and Ohio railway, and early in September he marched south- 
ward to attack Floyd, Avherever he might be, leaving a force under General J. 
J. Reynolds to confront Lee in the Cheat Mountain region. With great labor 
Rosccj-ans's troops climbed over the Gauley Mountains, and on the 10th 
[Sept.], passing through Summersville, they fell upon the Confederates at Car- 
nifcx Ferry. A severe battle for three or four hours ensued. It ceased at 
dusk. Rosecrans intended to renew it in the morning, but his foes fled under 
cover of the darkness, and did not halt until they reached the summit of Big 
Sewell IVfountain, thirty miles distant. 

The battle at Carnifex Ferry was soon followed by stirring movements 
l)etween Reynolds and Lee. The former was holding the roads and passes of 
tlie more westerly ranges of the great Alleghany chain, from Webster, on the 
Baltimore and Ohio railway, to the head-waters of the Gauley, crossing the 
spurs of the Greenbrier Mountains. When Rosecrans moved against Floyd, 
Reynolds was at the western foot of the mountains, not far from Huttonsville. 
Lee was farther south. Ilis scouts were everywhere active, and it Avas evi- 
dent, early in September, that he contemplated an attack either upon Reynolds 
or Rosecrans. lie was watched with sleepless vigilance, and on the day after 
the battle at Carnifex Ferry it was perceived that he was about to strike the 
Nationals at Elkwater and on the Summit,^ for the purpose of securing the 
great Cheat Mountain Pass, through Avhich lay the road to Staunton, and so 
obtain free communication with the Shenandoah Valley. His troops attacked 
the two posts just named [Sept. 12, 18G1], and Avere repulsed. Lee then with- 
drew from the Cheat Mountain region and joined Floyd, between the Gauley 
and New River, Avhere the combined forces under his command amounted 



' Page 56.^.. * Page 549. 

^ Here, as we h.ave seen [page 563], General McClellan established a post, and left there an 
Indiana regiment, under Colonel Kimball. It was an important point on the great highway from 
Thittonsvillo, over the lofty ranges of mountains to Staunton. 



18G1.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 579 

to about 20,000 men. There he Avas confronted by Roseerans with about 
10,000 men, composed of the brigades of Cox, Benham, and Schenck. 

Lee, whose campaign had been thus far a failure, was soon recalled and 
sent to Georgia. The Avretched Wise was ordered to Richmond, and Floyd 
and Roseerans again became competitors for victory. Floyd took post on the 
left or western bank of the New River late in October, from whicli he was 
driven [Nov. 12] by the forces under Roseerans, and pursued about fifty miles 
southward. There Floyd took leave of his army, and a few months later he 
was seen in a disgraceful position at Fort Donelson, in Tennessee. Meanwhile 
General Kelley, who had recovered from his wounds,' was performing gallant 
service in defense of the line of the Baltimore and Ohio railway ; and on the 
26th of October he struck the insurgents a blow at Romney that paralyzed 
the rebellion in that region. General Robert H. Milroy, who had succeeded 
Reynolds, was also active in the Cheat Mountain region, with his head- 
quarters, at fii-st, at the Summit. In that vicinity he fought the Confederates 
under Colonel E. Johnston, of Georgia, and was repulsed. He was more suc- 
cessful in an expedition against the Confederates at Huntersville, Lee's old 
head-quarters." He disj^ersed the insurgents there late in December, destroyed 
their stores, and released some Union j^risoners. This event closed the cam- 
paign in Western Virginia in 1861. 

While the events we have just considered were occurring in Western 
Virginia and in the Mississippi Valley, others even more important in their 
relations to the great contest were occurring on the sea-coast. We have 
already considered some hostile movements in the vicinity of Fortress Monroe.^ 
In Hampton Roads (the harbor in front of that fortress) and the then smoking 
ruins of Hampton Village,'* a large land and naval armament was seen in 
August, 1861. It was designed for an expedition down the Atlantic coast, the 
land forces imder General B. F. Butler' and the naval forces under Commodore 
Silas H. Stringham. Its destination Avas Hatteras Inlet, eighteen miles from 
Cape Hatteras, Avhei-e the Confederates had erected two forts (Ilatteras and 
Clarke) on the western end of Hatteras Island. The fleet, composed of trans- 
ports for the troops and war vessels, gathered off* the Inlet toward the even- 
ing of the 2'7th of August, and on the following morning the navy opened fire 
on the forts and some of the land troops Avere put ashore. The assault was. con- 
tinued at intervals by both arms of the service until the 29th, when the forts 
were formally surrendered to Stringham and Butler by S. Barron, Avho com- 

' Page 562. » Page 578. ' Page 562. 

* After the battle at Big Bethel [page 562], General Butler abandoned the village of Hamp- 
ton, which he had previously occupied, and confined his troops to Fortress Monroe and Newport- 
Newce. The whole country between Old Point Comfort, on which Fortress Monroe lies, and 
Yorlctown, was thus left open to Confederate rule. Magruder, with about 5,000 men, moved 
down the peninsula and took post near the village of Hampton, for the purpose of closely invest- 
ing the Fortress. Skirmishes ensued at Hampton bridge, and on the night of the 7th of August, 
Magruder, while drunken with liquor, ordered the village to be burnt. The act was performed by 
Virginians. So wanton was it that the venerable parish church, standing out of danger from the 
flames of the town, was fired and destroyed. 

'' General Butler was succeeded in the command at Fortress Monroe by tlie veteran General 
John E. "Wool. 



580 



X A T I X 



[18G1. 




FOET HATTEEAS. 



manded a little squadron in Pamlico Sound, and Colonel Martin and Major 
Andrews, in command of the Confederate troops." The post was then gar- 
risoned by a portion of Colonel Hawkins's New York Zouave regiment, and 
the expedition returned to Hampton Roads. General Butler was then com- 
,- = missioned to go to New 

England to "raise, arm, 
uniform, and equip a vol- 
unteer force for the war." 
It was done. Their im- 
mediate services will be 
observed hereafter. 

Hawkins was re-en- 
forced in September by 
some Indiana troops, and 
early in October the lat- 
ter, then a few miles up 
the Island, were attacked 
and driven back to the forts by some Confederates, wdio came over in steamers 
from Roanoke Island. Meanwhile Hawkins had issued a conciliatory address to 
the neighboring inhabitants of North Carolina. A convention of loyal citizens 
Avas held [Oct. 12], Avho called another, when a statement of grievances and a 
declaration of their independence of the Confederate government of North 
Carolina Avas adopted [No\^ 18, 1861]. There Avas so much promise of good 
in this movement, that the President ordered an election there for a member 
of Congress. One Avas chosen [Nov. 27], but this germ of active loyalty 
Avas soon crushed by the heel of Confederate poAver.- But the substantial 
A'ictory gained by the National forces Avas a severe bloAV to the cause of the 
conspirators, for it opened the Avay to most important results in faA^or of the 
National authorities, as Ave shall observe hereafter. 

During the summer of 1861, Fort Pickens and its vicinity Avere AA'itnesses 
of stirring scenes. We have observed that the fort was saved from capture 
early in the year through the vigilance and bravery of Lieutenant Slemmer 
and his little garrison, and that it was re-enforced.^ The troops that first Avent 
to the relief of Slemmer [April 12, 1861] Avere marines from the gOA'ernment ves- 



' Barron was a naval officer wlio had abandoned his flag and joined the insurgents. The cap- 
tives received tiie treatment of prisoners of war. They were taken to New York, and afterward 
exchanged. Not one of the soldiers ef the attacking fleet or army was injured in the fray. The 
loss of the Confederates was twelve or fifteen killed and thirty-five wounded. 

* Tills movement was brought prominently before the citizens of New York bj^ Rev. M. N. 
Taylor, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, at a meeting over which Mr. Ban- 
croft, the historian, presided. Taylor said that "some 4,000 of the inhabitants living on the 
narrow strip of land on the coast had, on the first arrival of the troops, flocked to take the oath 
of allegiance, and this had cut them off from their scanty resources of traffic with the interior. 
They were a poor race," he said, "living principally by fishing and gathering of yoakum, an 
evergreen of spontaneous growth, which they dried and exchanged for corn." The yoakum is a 
plant which is extensively used in that region as a sub.stitute for tea. 

The appeal of Mr. Taylor in behalf of these people was nobly responded to by generous gifta 
of money, food, and clothing. 

' See note 6, page 559. 



1861.] LINCOLX'S AD Ml X I ST RAT ION. 58X 

sels Sabine and St. Louis, lying: ^^ the fort, and artillerymen under Captain 
Vogdes, from the Brooklyn? They were there just in time to co-operate with 
a loyal man at the Navy Yard in saving the fort from capture. ** The garrison 
was again re-enforced, a few days later, by several hundred troops under Colo- 
nel Harvey Brown, who took the command, and Slemmer Avas furloughed for 
rest. Still later, while Bragg was gathering a large force in the vicinity, more 
troops Avere sent to defend the post. These were the New York Sixth regi- 
ment (Zouaves), Colonel William Wilson, Avho Avere encamped [June] on 
Santa Eosa Island, on Avhich Fort Pickens stands. Early in October the Con- 
federates on the main attempted to surprise and capture them. It Avas done 
in the dark, with the cry of " Death to Wilson ! No quarter !"* The assailed 




ZouaA-es fought desperately in the gloom, and Avith the aid of help from the 
fort, under Majors Yogdes and Arnold, the invaders, after burning Wilson's 
camp, Avere driA^en to their boats Avith a loss of one hundred and fifty men, 
including some aa^Iio were droAvncd. The Nationals lost in killed, Avounded, 
and prisoners, sixty-four men. 

^ Lieutenant Worden, of the XaAy, Avas sent by the government overland Avith a message to 
tlie commander of the fleet off Pensacola, directing the re-enforcement of Pickens. On his 
return he Avas treacherously used by Bragg, and suffered a long captivitj-, as a prisoner of Avar. 
in the jail at Montgomery. 

" This was Richard Wilcox. The Confederates Avere in possession of the Xavy Yard at "War- 
rington, opposite Fort Pickens, Avhere Wilcox, unsuspected of loyalty, Avas employed as a watch- 
man. He discovered that one of Slemmer's sergeants was in complicity with the Confederate 
commander in a plan for capturing tlie fort. Wilcox found means to apprise Slemmer of the- 
fact. It Avas to have been executed on the night after Worden's arrival. 

^ It Avas the general impression that Wilson's ZouaA^es were composed of Ncav York " roughs," 
and the Southern people Avere taught to believe that they Avere sent for the purposes of plunder 
and rapine. 



582 



THE NATION. 



[1861, 



Fort Pickcins had been silent since the spring-time. Late in November its 
utterances were heai'd for miles along the Gulf coast, mingled with the thun- 
der of cannon on war-vessels, co-operating in an attack upon the forts and 
batteries of the Confederates on the Florida main, then manned by about seven 
thousand troops under Bragg. The fort, and the steamers Niagara and Rich- 
mond, opened on the Confederate works on the morning of the 22d of Novem- 
ber, In the course of forty-eight hours, the heavy guns of the foe were 
silenced, and most of the Navy Yard, and the villages of Wolcott and War- 
rington, adjoining, were laid in ashes by shells from the fort. After that there 
was quiet in Pensacola Bay until the first of January [1862], Avhen another 
artillery duel occurred, lasting about twelve hours, but with little effect. 

Farther westward along the Gulf coast little sparks of war Avere seen at 
this time. The most notable of these was occasioned by a collision at the 
mouth of the Mississippi River [October 12], between the National blockading 
squadron, at the Southwest Pass, and a flotilla under Captain Hollins, of Grey- 
town notoriety.' By a telegraphic dispatch to the conspirators at Richmond, 
that startled the whole country, Hollins claimed a great victory, when the fact 
was that the only -damage he had inflicted on his foe was slight bruises on a 
coal-barge, while he Avas driven up the river to Fort Jackson in great terror, 
because of the danger of his being caught and hanged as a traitor.' He Avas 
in command of a ranr called Manassas^ Avhich promised to be formidable in 

competent hands, and this fact hastened 
preparations for sending an expedition 
to tlie LoAver Mississippi, 

There Avas another land and naval 
ai-mament in Hampton Roads in October, 
more formidable and imj^osing than the 
one seen there in August.'* There were 
fifty Avar-vessels and transports, and on 
the latter AA^ere 15,000 troops, under 
General T, W. Sherman, The fleet Avas 
commanded by Commodore S. F. Du- 
])ont, and all went to sea on a beautiful 
autumnal day (October 29, 1861), the 
flag-ship Wabash leading. Their des- 
tination Avas unknoAvn to all but the 
cliief commander, but each ship carried 




S. F. DUPOXT. 



' See note 3. page 522. 

* The following is a copy of the dispatch, dated at Fort Jackson, below New Orleans, Octo- 
ber 12, 18G1: — "Last night 1 attacked tlie blockaders with my little fleet. I succeeded, after a 
A-ery sliort struggle, in driving them all agronnd on the Southwest Pass bar, except the Preble, 
avhich I.iunJc. I captured a prize from them, and after they Avere fast in sand, I peppered them 
well. There were no casualties on our side. It was a complete success. — Hollins." This dis- 
patch and the facts caused the silly Hollins to be " peppered " well with ridicule. 

' A " ram " was an iron-clad vessel with a long, strong, sharp-pointed iron beak extending 
from its bow, by which, when the vessel, impelled by steam, was in full motion, another might be 
pushed, penetrated, and sunk. These Avere very formidable Aveapons of war on the rivers. 

* See page 579. 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



583 



sealed orders, to be opened in the event of a dispersion. That contingency 
occurred. The expedition had just passed Cape Ilatteras, when a teiTible storm 
arose, and on the morning of the 2d of November only one of the other ves- 
sels might be seen from the deck of the flag-ship.' The sealed orders were 
opened. These directed a general rendezvous off Port Royal entrance, on 
the coast of South Carolina, and there all of the vessels, excepting four trans- 
ports, were gathered around their leader by the evening of the 4th. The four 
transports had been lost, but no life was sacrificed, in tlie great storm. 

Port Royal entrance is between Hilton Head and Phillip's Island, and on 
each was a fort that commanded the channel. In Port Royal Sound was a 
small flotilla under Commodore Tattnall, and this, with the land troops who 
garrisoned the forts, comprised the obstacles to the entrance of the expedition. 
These were soon removed. On the morning of the Yth [Nov. 1861] every thing 
was in readiness. Dupont's war-vessels moved in, and, making an elliptical 
course, jjoured upon the forts^ a storm of shell that soon silenced them. Tatt- 
nall's little fleet fled to the shelter of narrower waters ; the land troops under 
■Generals Wright and Stevens went on shore and took possession, and the Con- 
federates abandoned the region and hastened to the main. The National forces 
took possession of Beaufort and the surrounding islands which the white peo- 
ple had abandoned," and the last effort of the Confederates to defend them was 
at Port Royal Ferry, where, after a severe engagement [January 1, 1862], 
they were defeated and dispersed. Du- _, " ~^_ 

pont, meanwhile, had taken 2>ossession of 
Tybee Island, at the mouth of the Savan- 
nah River, without opposition ; and at 
the close of 1861 the National authority 
was supreme over the coast islands, from 
Wassaw Sound to tlie North Edisto 
River, well up toward Charleston. At 
about the same time an ineffectual 
attempt was made to temporarily close 
the harbor of Charleston, as a part of the 
method of blockade, by sinking vessels 
laden with stones in its ehaimels of ap- 




PORT ROYAL FERRY. 



' This storm gave great hope of disaster to the National cause, among the Confederates, to 
whom the departure of the expedition was known. The}" declared that tlie elements were assist- 
ing them. "The stars in their courses fought against Sisera," said a jubilant Richmond journal, 
and added, "So the winds of lieaven fight for the good cause of Southern Independence. Let 
the Deborahs of tlie South sing a song of deliverance." 

" The work on Hilton Head was named Fort "Walker, in honor of the Confederate " Secretary 
of War;" and that on Bay Point of Phillip's Island, Fort Beauregard, in honor of an insurgent 
leader. 

^ Tlie negroes, generally, remained, excepting those whose masters had compelled them to 
accompany them in their flight. Those who remained were soon organized into industrial com- 
munities, and a large quantity of the valuable "Sea-Island Cotton," which the owners had not 
burnt on leaving, was secured. The fi^ith of the slaves in the National government, and their 
belief that the invaders were their friends, and were to be their deliverers from bondage, were 
here first exhibited in a remarkable degree. They had been assured that the "Yankees," as all 
the inliabitants of the Free-labor States were called, were coming to steal them and s&li them into 



584 



THE NATION, 



proach.' "While the "stone fleet," as these vessels Avere called, was approach- 
ing, a fearful conflagration laid a large portion of the city of Charleston in 
ruins. 

Let us now turn from the sea-coast, and observe the current of events at 
and near the ISTational capital. 

The new organization of the Array of the Potomac, as we have observed," 
was perfected at the middle of October. The Confederates, under Johnston,, 
were yet lying in comparative inactivity near the field of their victory at 
Bull's Run, in July,^ with the head-quarters of their leader at Centreville. 
Because of a lack of cavalry and adequate subsistence, Johnston had been 
compelled to lie idle, and see the army of his opponent grow immensely in the 
space of a few weeks. He knew it would be simple rashness to do as the shal- 
low Beauregard desired, and attack the intrenched Nationals at Washington ; 
and because of the interference of Davis, as Confederate experts say, he had 
not the means for executing his favorite scheme of crossing the Potomac into 
Maryland, and taking the National capital in reverse. So for several months 
these principal armies of the combatants lay within thirty miles of each other, 
without coming into a general collision. The people on both sides became 
impatient of delay. In the hearts of the loyalists still burned the desire which 
had given to their lips the cry of " On to Richmond !" but the memory of the 
disasters at Bull's Run* made them circumspect and quiet. From time to time 
they were cheered by rumors and movements which promised an immediate 
advance. There were grand reviews, active drills, and sometimes skirmishes 
with the Confederates, whose audacity became amazing as the autumn 
advanced and the Nationals remained quiet. Their pickets approached witliin 
cannon-shot of Washington City, and for weeks they held Munson's Hill,, 
where their flag might be seen from the dome of the Capitol. 

We have observed^ that the Confederate batteries blockaded the Potomac. 
So early as June [1861] the Navy Dej:)artment had called the attention of the 
military authorities to the possibility and danger of such an event, but noth- 
ing was done to prevent it until the close of September, when Confederate bat- 
teries were planted along the Virginia shore of the stream. Preparations 
were then made by McClellan to act in conjunction with the gun-boats on the 
Potomac in removing these perilous obstructions, but his delays, and his failure 
to co-operate with the naval force at the proper moment, paralyzed all eflbrts,, 
and that blockade, so disgraceful to the government, and especially to the 
great army near the capital, was continued until the Confederates voluntarily 
evacuated their position in front of Washington, in March following. 

worse bondage in Cuba; and horrible tales were told to them of the "Northerners," who were 
described as monsters intent upon killing them and bur^-ing them in the sand. But that simple 
people did not believe a word of these tales. They universally beheved that tlie Lord had sent 
the " Yankees '' to take them out of bondage ; and when our ships appeared, they were seen 
with little bundles of clothing on the shores, desiruag to go on board. 

' The "stone fleet" was composed of twenty-five old vessels, chiefly whalers, which sailed 
from New England heavily laden with granite. These were sunken m the four channels, but 
were soon removed by the currents or lost in quicksands, for their presence was scarcelj' percep- 
tible after a few days. 

^ Page 571. = Page 569. ^ Page 570. = Page 565. 



1861.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION 585 

The Army of the Potomac was judiciously posted for offensive or defensive 
measures from Budd's Ferry, on the Lower Potomac, to Poolesville, near the 
Upper Potomac. As it increased in numbers, it needed more space on the Vir- 
ginia side of the river than the narrow strip between the Potomac and the 
Confederate outposts. Measures were accordingly taken for pushing back tlie 
foe, and these resulted in skirmishes. One occurred near Lewinsville [Sept. ] 2, 
1861] between the National troops, under General W. F. Smith, and Confede- 
rates, under Colonel J. E. B. Stuart, afterward the famous cavalry leader, in 
which the Nationals were victors. A little later [September 15] some Confed- 
erates crossed the Potomac and attacked troops under Colonel J. W. Geary, 
not far from Darnestown, in Maryland, and were repulsed. Emboldened by 
successes, the Nationals advanced, and at the middle of October they per- 
manently occupied a line from Fairfax Court House well up toward Lees- 
burg. The Confederates retired from Munson's Hill [Sept. 28] and other 
advanced posts,* and fell back to Centreville without firing a shot. 

Early in October some National troops crossed the Potomac at Harper's 
Ferry,^ to seize some wheat at mills near there belonging to the Confederates. 
Menaced by approaching foes, they called for help. Colonel Geary led six hun- 
dred men to their aid, and on the hills back of the village of Harper's Ferry, 
he had a severe contest [Oct. 16, 1861] with a superior force on his front and 
the heights near. He finally repulsed his foe, and the whole invading force 
recrossed the river into Maryland. This movement was speedily followed by 
a more important one. For some time the left Aving of the Confederate army 
under General Evans had been lying at Leesburg, confronted by a considero,- 
ble National force under General Charles P. Stone, encamped between Conrad's 
and Edward's ferries, on the Upper Potomac. On being informed (errone- 
ously) that the Confederates had left the vicinity of Leesburg, McClellan 
ordered General McCall to make a reconnoissance from Drainsville in that 
direction, and telegraphed to Stone to aid the movement by a feint indicative 
of an intention to cross with his whole force. This was done at both ferries, 
and a part of a Massachusetts regiment, under Colonel Devens, was ordered to 
Harrison's Island, in the Potomac, abreast of Ball's Bluff. A reserve of three 
thousand men, under Colonel E. D. Baker, a member of the National Senate, 
acting as brigadier, was held in readiness to cross promptly, if necessary. 

Misinformed concerning the position of the Confederates, and supposing 
McCall to be near to assist, if necessary. Stone ordered some Massachusetts 
troops, under Colonels Devens and Lee, to cross to the Virginia main from Har- 
rison's Island. They found no foe between Ball's Bluff and Leesburg. But 
Evans was near in strong force, watching them, and at little past noon [Oct. 

' For several weeks the Confederate works on Munson's Hill had been looked upon with much 
respect, because of their apparently formidable character. They were really slight earth- 
structures, inclosing, by an irregular line around the brow of the hiU, about four acres of ground, 
and the principal armament, which had inspired the greatest awe, consisted of one stove-pipe and 
two logs, the latter with a black disc painted on the middle of the sawed end of each, giving them 
the appearance, at a short distance, of the muzzles of 100-pounder Parrott guns I These "Quaker 
guns," like similar ones at Manassas, had for six weeks defied the Army of the Potomac. 

' Page 557. 



586 



THE NATION. 



[1861. 



21, 1861] he assailed the invading troops, who had fallen back to the vicinity 
of Ball's Bluff. Baker had already been sent with reserves to Harrison's 
Island, clothed with discretionary j^ower to withdraw the other troops, or 
re-enfoi-ce them. Supposing the force under McCall and others to be near, he 
concluded to q;o forward. On reaching the field, he took the chief command 
by virtue of his rank, and was soon afterward instantly killed,' His troops, 
unsupported,'' were overwhelmed by a superior force, and pushed back in great 
disorder toward the bluff. They were driven down the declivity at twilight, 
where, unable to cross the swollen flood for want of transportation, they fought 
desperately a short time, when they were overpowered, and a large number 
were made prisoners. Many perished in trying to escape.^ The entire 
National loss was full a thousand men, and two pieces of cannon. It was a 
disaster inexplicable to the public mind. An explanation was loudly called 
for, but the General-in-Chief declared that an inquiry " at that time would be 
injurious to the public service." It was stifled, and Genei-al Stone, whom 
McClellan at the time acquitted of all lilame,'' was afterward made a victim to 
appease the popular indignation.^ 



' Eye-witness said that a tall, red-haired man suddenly emerged from the smoke, and when 
■within live feet of Baker discharged into his body the contents of a self-cocking revolving pistol, 
and at the same moment a bullet pierced his skuU just behind his ear. His death produced a 
profound sensation, and public honors were paid to his memory afterward. He was one of the 
most eloquent men in the National Senate. 

'' McCleUan had ordered McCall, the previous evening, to fall back to Drainsville. He neg- 
lected to inform Stone of this order. Had he done so. Baker would have recalled the troops on 
the Virginia side, and the disaster at Ball's Bluff would have been prevented. 

^ Only one large flat-boat was there, and that, with an overload of wounded and others, at 
the begiiining of its first voyage, was riddled by bullets and sunk. The smaller vessels had ciis- 
appeared in tlie gloom, and' there was no means of escape for the Unionists but by swimming. 
Some, attempting'this, were shot in the water, others were drowned, and a few escaped. 

* On the evening of October 22, 1861, McClellan, who had gone to the head-quarters of 
Stone, telegraphed to the President, saying, " I have investigated this matter, and General Stone 
is without blame." 

^ A hundred da^'S after the battle, when General Stone, in command of about 12,000 men, 
was preparing to strike the Confederates under D. H. Hill, lying opposite his camp, he was 

arrested at midnight in "VVash- 
_^^^r^^-:r- ington City, by order of General 

McClellan, who directed him to 
be conveyed immediately to 
Fort Lafayette, near New York, 
then used as'a prison for persons 
charged with treasonable acts. 
There he was kept m close 
continement fifty-four days, 
when he was transferred to 
Fort Hamilton, near. He was 
released on the 16th of August, 
1862, but for nearly a year 
afterward he was denied em- 
])lo.yment in the field. General 

Stone was never informed why 

"^ " - ' ^=^r -^=^ he was arrested, and no charge 

Fiiur LAFAYETTE. of miscouduct of anv kind was 

ever officially made against him. 
He appears to have been made a scape-goat for the sins of his superiors. Without any apparent 
cause, that faithful officer and zealous friend of the country was made to suffer, unjustly, the cruel 
t^uspicion of being a traitor For a full vindication of his loyalty, made upon evidence, see Los- 
sings Pictorial History of the Civil War, ii. 146. 




^d^M 







1861.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION 587 

For the space of nearly two months after the disaster at Ball's Bluff, the 
public ear was daily teased with the unsatisfactory report : " All is quiet on 
the Potomac !" The roads leading toward the Confederate camps near Bull's 
Run were never in better condition. The entire autumn had been a magnifi- 
cent one in Virginia. Regiment after regiment was rapidly swelling the 
ranks of the Army of the Potomac to the number of two hundred thousand 
men, thoroughly equipped and fairly disciplined, while at no tnne did any 
reliable report make the number of the Confederate army over sixty thousand. 
Plain people wondered why so few, whom politicians called "ragamuffins" and 
a " mob," could so tightly hold the Xational capital in a state of siege, while 
so large a number of " the bravest and best men of the North " were in and 
around it. But what did plain people know about war? Therefore it was 
that when, late in December, the " quiet on the Potomac " was slightly dis- 
turbed by General E. O. C. Ord, who, with his brigade, fought a smaller 
number of Confederate foragers [Dec. 20, 1861], under J. E. B. Stewart, near 
Prainsville, and whipped them soundly, after a severe contest, the loyal people 
■were delighted, for it gave them assurance that the Army of the Potomac was 
ready to fight bravely, whenever permitted to encounter the foe. 

While the friends of the government were anxiously waiting for the almost 
daily promised movement of the Grand Army toward Richmond as the year 
[1861] was drawing to a close, and hearts were growing sick with hope 
deferred, two events, each having an important bearing on the war, were in 
progress : one directly affecting the issue, and the other affecting it incidentally, 
but powerfully. One was an expedition that made a permanent lodgment of 
the National power on the coast of North Carolina, and the other was inti- 
m.ately connected with the foreign relations of the government. Let us first 
consider the last-mentioned event. 

We have already observed that the conspirators, at an early period of their 
operations, sent commissioners to Europe to seek recognition and aid from 
foreign govei'nments.' Their employers soon perceived the incompetency of 
these men to serve their bad cause acceptably, and they commissioned James 
M. Mason'' and John Slidell,^ two of their ablest and most unscrupulous com- 
peers, full " embassadors," the former accredited to the British government 
and the latter to the French government. These conspirators, each accom- 
panied by a secretary, left Charleston in a blockade-runnei" on a stormy night 
[October 12, 1861] and proceeded to Cuba, Avhere they took i>assage in the 
English steamer Trent for St. Thomas, intending to go from there in the 
regular packet to England. Off the northern coast of Cuba the Trent was 
intercepted [November 8] by the National war-steamer San Jacinto^ Captain 
Charles Wilkes,^ who took from the British vessel the two " embassadors " 
and their secretaries, and conveyed them in the San Jacinto to Boston harbor, 
where they were placed in Fort Warren, then used, like Fort Lafayette,* as 
a prison for political offenders. 

> Page 559. "" Page 522. " Page 335. 

^ The commander of the South Sea Exploring Expedition, mentioned on page 476. 
* Page 586. 



TIIK NATIOX. 



[18G1. 



The act of Captain Wilkes Avas applauded by all loyal men, and was 
justified and commended by the Secretary of the Navy, Avho assured hinx 

that it had the " emphatic approval of 
the Department." It was in strict con- 
formity to the British interpretation, 
theoretically and practically, of inter- 
national law, but it was in violation of 
often uttered American principles in rela- 
tion to the rights of neutrals — princi- 
ples for the maintenance of which the 
United States declared war against 
Great Britain in 1812.' With great 
inconsistency, the British government 
regarded it as a national insult, and, 
before any communication could be 
had /with our government, made exten- 
sive preparations for wai', with the 
same unseemly haste which characterized it in procuring the Queen's 
proclamation of neutrality.^ A peremptory demand was made for the- 
delivery of Mason and Slidell, and, when the matter became a subject for 
calm discussion, that demand was complied with, not becaiise it was made 
in a truculent spirit, but because fidelity to American principles required 
it.* The conspirators were delivered [January 1, 1S02] on board tlie 
British gun-boat JRinaldo, in which they were conveyed to St. Tlionias, Avhere 




CHAELES WILKES. 



1 Page 409. 

^ Page 561. The British press and British speakers in 
the interest of the government, led by the London Times, 
indulged in the coarsest abuse of the government and 
loyal people of the United States. So urgent seemed the 
necessity for preparations for M'ar, that on Sunday, the 
daj^ after the arrival of the news of the "Trent outrage," 
as it was called, reached England, men were engaged in 
the Tower of London in packing 2,500 muskets to be sent 
to Canada. Orders were issued for a large increase in the 
naval squadrons on the North American and T\'est India 
stations, and the great steam-packet Persia was taken from 
the mail service to be employed in carrying troops to 
Canada. American securities were depressed, and fortunes 
were thereby made by wise persons, under the shadow of 
high places, who jrarchased and held them for a rise. The 
whole warlike movement was made to appear still more 
ridiculous, when our Secretarj^ of State (William H. Seward), 
with inimitable iron}^, offered [Januarj^ 12, 18C>2] the use 
of the railway that extends through the United States ter- 
ritory from Portland, Maine, into Canada, for the trans- 
portation of British troops to be sent to fight ns, the St. 
Lawrence at that winter season being frozen, and therefore 
useless as a channel for British transports. 

^ The calm thoughtfulness of President Lincoln, in the midst of the storm of passion that pre- 
vailed on the reception of the news of the capture of Mason and Slidell, -was a salutary 
power. To the writer, who had an interview with him a few hours after the news reached 
Washington, lie said: "I fear the traitors will prove to be white elephants. We must stick to 
American principles concerning the rights of neutrals. We fought Great Britain for insisting, by 
theory and practice, on the right to do precisely what Captain Wilkes has done. If Great 
Britaia shall now protest against the act, and demands their release, we must give them up^ 




WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 



1861.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



589 



they embarked for England. They were treated with merited contempt in 
Oreat Britain, and soon passed into obscurity.' This act of our government 
disappointed the hopes of the conspirators, for they expected great advantages 
to accrue to their cause by a Avar between Great Britain and our Republic. 
It silenced the arrogant pretensions of Great Britain concerning its right of 
search and of impressment, and made its hasty and belligerent actions in the 
premises appear like an extremely ridiculous farce. 



CHAPTER XVII 



THE CIVIL WAR. [1861—1865.] 

The public mind was just becoming tranquil after the excitement caused 
Iby the " Trent affair," when its attention was keenly fixed on another expedi- 
tion to the coast of North Carolina, already alluded to. The land and naval 
armaments of which it was composed were assembled in Hampton Roads early 
in January, 1862. It comprised over one hundred steam and sailing vessels 
(warriors and transports), and about sixteen thousand troops, mostly recruited 
in New England. Of this expedition General Ambrose E. Burnside was com. 
mander-in-chief, and the naval opera- 
tions were intrusted to flag-officer Louis 
M. Goldsborough, then the commander 
of the North Atlantic Naval Squadron. 
Burnside's lieutenants were Generals 
Foster, Reno, and Parke, each in com- 
mand of a brigade. The fleet was in 
two sections, in charge respectively of 
Commanders Rowan and Hazard. The 
expedition went to sea on the lltb of 
January [1862]. Its destination had 
been kept a profound secret. 

This, like the other expeditions, 
encountered gales in the vicinity of 
stormy Cape Hatteras. Pamlico Sound 
and Roanoke Island was its destination, and it was sevei-al days before the 

apologize for the act as a violation of our doctrines, and thus forever bind her over to keep tL?? 
peace in relation to neutrals, and so aclcnowledge that she has been wrong for at least sixty years " 
This was the key to the admirable action of our government by the able Secretary of State. 

' " Already," said a leading Liverpool journal, on their arrival, "the seven weeks' heroes have 
shrunk to their natural dimensions;" and the London Times, speaking of the demand made by the 
government, and of their release, spoke of them as "worthless booty," and said, " England would 
have done just as much for two negroes." 




A. E. BTJRNSIDE. 



590 THE NATION. [186?. 

vessels, dispersed hv tlie -u'ind, had entered Hatteras Inlet. It was February 
before the expedition moved to an attack upon Roanoke Island, Avhich the 
Confederates had fortified. They liad also obstructed the channels near it., 
and within these was a little flotilla of armed vessels, under the command of 
Lieutenant W. F. Lynch, who had abandoned his flag". The batteries planted 
at difierent points numbered about forty heavy guns, which had been taken 
from the Navy Yard at Gosport,' and were manned by North Carolina troops,, 
under the chief command of Colonel H. M. Shaw." Upon the principal one of 
these (Fort Bartow), Goldsborough opened fire toward noon of the 6th of 
February, and that night, in the midst of a cold storm of rain, about eleven 
thousand troops Avere landed. These moved early the next morning to attack 
intrenchments that stretched across the narrower part of the island, General 
Foster leading. The Confederates made a gallant defense, but were driven 
before the Nationals, who outnumbered them." One after another of the other 
works yielded, the Confederate flotilla fled up Albemarle Sound, and Roanoke 
Island passed into the possession of the National forces.* This was the severest 
blow the Confederates had yet experienced. It exposed the entii-e main of 
North Carolina bordering on Pamlico and Albemarle Sounds to the National 
power, and opened a door of entrance to Norfolk in the rear.* 

The Confederate flotilla Avas followed [Februaiy 9] by Rowan, and in the 
Pasquotank River, near Elizabeth City, not far from the Dismal Swamp, it 
and land batteries were attacked by the National gun-boats. The vessels 
were abandoned, the batteries were silenced, and Lynch, with his men and the 
land troops, retired into the interior. The National flag was then planted on 
one of the shore batteries, and this was the portion of the main of North 
Carolina first " re-possessed " by the government. The conquest was followed 
by others for securing the control of the Sounds and the adjacent country ; and 
Burnside and Goldsborough jointly issued a proclamation [February 18, 1861] 
to the peaceable inhabitants, assuring them that the government forces were 
there as their friends and not as enemies, and inviting them to separate them- 
selves from the rule of the conspirators and return to their allegiance. This 
was met by a savage counter-proclamation by the Governor of North Carolina, 
and the poor, oppressed people, who longed for deliverance, were held firmly 
under the yoke of the Confederate despotism. Here we will leave the National 
forces in the waters of North Carolina, prej^aring for other victories soon, and 

' Page 558. 

^ General Henry A. Wise had been the chief commiinder, but at this time he was on Nag's 
Head, a sand-spit outside of Roanoke Island, and reported ill. 

' In this attack a part of the Ninth New York (Hawkins's Zouaves), led by Major E. A. Kim- 
ball, made a gallant charge across a narrow causeway and drove the garrison from the redoubt. 
These, and portions of the Fifty-first New York and Twenty-first Massachusetts, entered the- 
works at about the same time, and the colors of the Fifty-first were first planted on the battery. 

* The National loss incurred in the capture of Eoauoke Island was about 50 kihed and 222 
wounded. That of tlie Confederates was 143 kihed, wounded, and missing. The spoils of vic- 
tory were forty-two heavy guns, three being 100-pounders. 

* The disaster spread consternation throughout the Confederacy. Davis, in a communication' 
to his "congress," casts reflections upon the Confederate troops engaged in the fight, but a com- 
mittee of that body charged the loss of the island to the remissness of Benjamin, the " Secretary, 
of War." 



18G2.] 



LINCOLN'S A D M I N I S T R AT 1 X 



391 



observe the course of military events in the Valley of the Mississippi. There 
we left Fi-emont's dispirited army marching toward St. Louis,' Soutliern and 
Western Kentucky in the hands of the Confederates," and all Tennessee under 
the heel of their military power. 

Late in 1861, the Department of Missouri was enlarged,^ and General IL 
W. Halleck, who had been called from California, was placed in command of 
it, and General Hunter Avas assigned to the command of the Department of 
Kansas.^ General Don Carlos Buell was placed in charge of the Department of 
the Ohio,^ and the Department of New Mexico was intrusted to Colonel E. R. S. 
Canby. Such were the military divisions of the territory west of the Alleghany 
Mountains at the close of 18G1, when Halleck, with his head-quarters at St. 
Louis, was holding the secessionists and insurgents in check with a vigorous 
hand. General Pope was assigned to all the National troops between the 
Missouri and Osage Rivers, in which region Price had been gathering recruits, 
after Hunter's retrograde movement.* Detachments fi-om Pope's army smote 
these banded recruits here and there ; and finally, at a bridge on the Black- 
water Creek, near Milford, Colonel Jefferson C. Davis fought and captured 
about a thousand insurgents,'' and secured as spoils nearly as many horses and 
mules, and a large quantity of munitions of wai-. By vigorous movements, 
Pope swept over the State west of Sedalia, toward Kansas, far enough to foil 
the attempt of organized recruits to join Price, and to compel that leader to 
withdraw, in search of subsistence and safety, to the borders of Arkansas. 

Late in December, Price, encouraged by promises of re-enforcements from 
Arkansas, concentrated about twelve 
thousand men at Sj)ringfield. Against 
these a strong force under General S. R. 
Curtis, assisted by Generals Asboth, 
Sigel, Davis, and Prentiss, moved in 
three columns early in February. Price 
fled with his ai"my on the night of the 
12th and 13th of that month, and did 
not halt until he reached a good position 
at Cross Hollows, in Northern Arkansas. 
He was driven a little farther south by 
the advance of the pursuing Curtis, and 
from near Pea Ridge, in Arkansas, he 
reported to Governor Jackson that he 
was " confident of the future." With 




S. R. CUBTIS. 



' Page 576. ■ Pages 575 and 577. 

^ It now included Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, "Wisconsin, Illinois, Arkansas, and that portion 
of Kentucky lying west of the Cumberland River. 

* This included the State of Kansas, the Indian Territory west of Arkansas, and the Terri- 
tories of Nebraska, Colorado, and Dakota. 

^ This included the State of Ohio and the portion of Kentucky lying eastward of the Cumber- 
land River. 

' Page 576. 

'' Among the captives was Colonel Magoffin, brother of the Governor of Kentucky. 



592 THE NATION. [1862. 

equal confidence of the future, Halleck reported that he had purged Mis- 
souri of armed insurgents, and that the flag of the Republic was waving in 
triumph over the soil of Arkansas. Curtis had crossed the line on the 18th of 
Februarj^, his soldiers cheering with delight as they saw the old banner waving 
in another of the so-called Confederate States. 

Curtis pushed on after Price, capturing squads of Missouri recruits, skir- 
mishing with the rear-guard of the fugitives at several places, and finally driv- 
ing the whole Confederate force over the range of hills known as the Boston 
Mountains. Then he fell back to Sugar Creek, not far from Bentonville, and 
encamped in a strong position. Price, meanwhile, had been joined by McCuU 
loch ; and early in March Earl Van Dorn, the Confederate commander of the 
Trans-Mississippi Department, and one of the most dashing and energetic offi- 
cers in that region, arrived at his camp and took chief command. There, too, 
he was joined by the notorious Albert Pike with a band of Indians, trained by 
him for savage warfare,' and these forces combined, almost twenty-five thousand 
strong, prepared to fall upon Curtis and drive him out of Arkansas. The force 
of the latter did not exceed eleven thousand men, with forty-nine pieces of 
artillery. 

Van Dorn advanced so cautiously that Curtis was not aware of his approach 
until he was very near [March 5], when the latter concentrated his forces near 
Mottsville, a short distance from Pea Ridge, a spur of the Ozark Mountains. 
There, on the morning of the '7th of March, Van Dorn, who Avas assisted by 
Generals Price, McCulloch, Mcintosh, and Pike, having accomplished a flank 
movement, in which a part of his force had a sharp contest with some troops 
under Sigel, proceeded to attack Curtis's main body in the rear. The latter 
promptly changed front to meet him, and took the initiative of battle. The 
struggle that ensued was very severe, and resulted in the loss to the Confede- 
rates of Generals McCulloch and Mcintosh, who were mortally wounded, and 
many brave soldiers on both sides. The battle was renewed the next morning, 
when the Confederates were soon routed, and Van Dorn's army was so suddenly 
broken into fragments, and so scattered in its flight, that Curtis was puzzled to 
know which way to pursue. The victory for the Nationals was complete, but 
the spoils were few.** Curtis held the battle-field. Van Dorn retired behind 
the mountains, and disappeared on the borders of the Indian country. At 
length the victor, perceiving no formidable foe in that region, mo^-ed leisurely 
toward the Mississippi River, in the direction of Helena. 

' Pike was a native of Boston, but long a resident in the Slave-labor States. He was com- 
missioned by Governor Rector to organize the most savage of the Indian tribes (Choctaws and 
Chickasaws) on the borders of Arkansas. He raised two regiments, was commissioned a briga- 
dier, and with them he joined the army of tlie conspirators. He dressed himself in gaudy cos- 
tume, and wore a large plume on his head to please the Indians ; and before the battle at Pea 
Ridge, it is said, he maddened them with liquor, that they might allow the savage nature of their 
race to have unchecked development. In their fury they respected none of the usages of civi- 
lized warfare, but scalped the helpless wounded, and committed atrocities too horrible to men- 
tion. After the war this man was among the earliest of the most conspicuous rebels, who was 
"pardoned " (as relief from amenability to law was called) without trial by President Johnston. 

^ Curtis lost 1.351 killed, wounded, and missing. Yan Dorn never reported his loss officially, 
but estimated it at about COO. The brunt of the strife fell upon the division of Colonel Carr, 
composed chiefly of Iowa and Missouri troops. He lost 701 men. 



1862.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



593 



While these events were occurring in Missouri and Arkansas, Hunter was 
"busily engaged in sujipressing rebellion on the borders of Kansas, and war was 
kindling in Canby's Department of Texas.' We have seen how Twiggs 
betrayed his army in the latter State f now the instruments of the conspira- 
tors attempted similar measures for attaching New Mexico to the Confederacy, 
Colonel Loring, a Noi'th Carolinian, had been sent there for the purpose, in 
1860, by Floyd, the traitorous Secretary of War.^ He was made commander 
of the Department of New Mexico, and he employed Colonel Geoi-ge B. Crit- 
tenden, an unworthy son of Senator Crittenden, of Kentucky,^ to corrupt the 
troops in that region. He failed, and Loring and Crittenden were compelled 
to flee from the coiintry to avoid the wrath of the loyal soldiery. The fugi- 
tive oflicers found those of a garrison on the frontiers of Texas ready to aid 
them in their treasonable designs. By these the troops were led out from the 
fort and betrayed into the hands of Texas insurgents, when it was believed 
New Mexico would fall an easy prey to the Confederate power. Otero, the 
delegate of that Territory in Congress, was in practical complicity with the 
conspirators, and all seemed working well for their cause, when Canby^ arrived 
and changed the aspect of afllxirs. The loyal people gathered around him. 
His regular troops. New Mexican levies, and volunteers, soon made a respecta- 
ble force, and these were speedily called to action, for Major H. H. Sibley, a 
Louisianian, who had abandoned his flag, invaded the Territory at the middle 
of February with 2,300 Texans, most of them rough "Rangers," when Canby 
was at Fort Craig, on the Rio Grande. Near 
that post (at Valverde), on the 21st of Febru- 
ary [1862], Canby and Sibley had a battle. 
The former, defeated, fled to Fort Craig, but 
the latter, alarmed at Canby's developed 
strength, instead of following, hurried tOAvard 
Santa Fe, the capital of the Territory. Can- 
by followed. Sibley captured but could not 
hold Santa Fe, and he was soon driven over 
the mountains into Texas. The area of the 
active rebellion now extended from Maryland 
to New Mexico, and was everywhere marked 
by vigor and terrible malevolence. 

Let us now see what was further done to- 
ward the execution of Fremont's plan for 
crushing the rebellion in the Mississippi Valley,^ 

We have observed how the Confederates obtained a foothold in Southern 
and Western Kentucky.' Under the shadow of military power there, a con- 
vention of secessionists was held [November 18, 1861], at which, with ludicrous 
gravity, a declaration of independence and an ordinance of secession were 
adopted, a provisional government was organized, and delegates were chosen 




TEXAS RANGER. 



Page 591. 
Page 591. 



Note 3, page 551. 



549. 



Page 5 "7 6. 
38 



Note 1, page 549. 
Pages 575 and 576. 



594 THE NATION. [1862. 

to the "Congress" of conspirators' at Richmond [Nov. 20, 1861]. Bowling 
Green, whei'e Buckner had made his head-quarters,* and where Albert Sidney 
Johnston, an able officer, who had abandoned his flag, was now in chief com- 
mand, was made the capital of the new State. Meanwhile Johnston was con- 
centrating troops there, and General Hardee was called from Soutliwestern 
Missouri to supersede Buckner. The position of Polk, at Columbus,^ was 
strengthened. Zollicoffer^ was firmly planted at the important Pass of Cum- 
berland Gap — a passage-way between Kentucky and East Tennessee — and for- 
tified posts were established betAveen the extremes of the army, the most 
important of which were Fort Donelson, on the Cumberland River, and Fort 
Henry, on the Tennessee River. 

In the mean time General Buell had organized a large force at Louisville.* 
These were thrown forward along the line of railway toward Bowling Green, 
40,000 strong, under General A. McD. McCook, and pushed the Confederate 
outposts beyond the Green River. In the mean time stirring events had 
occurred in Eastern Kentucky, where, near Prestonburg, on the Big Sandy, 
General Garfield fought [January 7, 1862] insurgents under Humphrey Mar- 
shall, and scattering them put an end to the military career of the latter leader. 
Farther westward a severe battle was fought [January 19], near Mill Spring, 
on the Cumberland River, between the Nationals, under General George H. 
Thomas, and Confederates led by Generals Zollicofier and Crittenden.* In this 
■engagement Thomas was victorious. Zollicofi:er was killed,' and the Confede- 
rates fled into Northeastern Tennessee through a country almost barren of sub- 
sistence. The battle was fought desperately by both parties, for victory was 
specially desirable to both. It proved to be a great advantage to the winner, 
and disastrous to the cause of the loser, for it broke the Confederate line in 
Kentucky,^ opened a door of deliverance for the East Tennesseeans, and pre- 
pared the way for a series of successful operations by which, very soon after- 
ward, the invaders were driven from both States. By order of the President, 
the Secretary of War said, in a public thanksgiving to the officers, " In the 
prompt and spirited movements and daring at Mill Spring, the nation will 
realize its hopes." 

' George W. Johnson was chosen provisional governor, with a legislative council of ten, a 
-treasurer, and an auditor. The farce of representing Kentucky in the Confederate Congress, now 
commenced, was kept up during the entire war. Tiie people had no voice in their appointment, 
and of such usurpers a greater portion of the so-called " Confederate Congress " was continually 
composed. 

- Page 576. ' Page 575. ■■ Page 577. 

^ General BueU had under his command, early in January, 1862, about 114,000 men, cbicflj 
citizens of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and loyalists of 
Kentucky and Tennessee, with about 126 pieces of artillery. This force was arranged in four 
grand divisions, commanded respectively by Brigadier-Generals Alexander McDowell McCook, 
'Ormsby M. Mitchel, George H. Thomas, and Thomas L. Crittenden, acting as major-geu'srals, 
aided by twenty brigade commanders. These divisions occupied an irregular line across the fcjtate, 
nearly parahel to that held by the Confederates. 

° This was the Crittenden employed to corrupt the army in New Mexico. See page 59? 

^ Thomas lost 247 men killed and wounded. The Confederate loss was 349, of whom 89 
were prisoners. The spoils of victory for Thomas were considerable, including twelve piece* of 
artniery, many small arms, and more than a thousand horses and mules. 

* Page 577. 



^SG2.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



595 




Z^^ 



H. W. HALLECK. 



It was now determined to concentrate the forces of Ilalleck and Buel in a 
^rand forward movement against the main bodies and fortifications of the Con- 
federates. Thomas's victory at Mill 
Spring had so paralj^zed that line east- 
ward of Bowling Green, that it was 
practically shortened at least one-half, 
and the bulk of the Confederates and 
their chief fortifications Averd* between 
Nashville and Bowling Green, and the 
Mississippi River. During the autumn 
-and early winter a naval armament, pro- 
jected by Fremont for service on that 
river, had been in preparation at St. 
Louis and Cairo, for co-02:)eration with 
the western armies, and at the close 
of January [1862] it consisted of twelve 
gun-boats, carrying one hundred and 
twenty-six heavy cannon, and some lighter guns, the whole commanded by 
flag-officer A. H. Foote, of the National navy. Seven of these were covered 
with plates of iron, and were built wide, so that, on the still waters of the 
rivers, M^hen attacking fortifications, their guns might have almost the steadi- 
ness of those in land batteries. 

Some movements preliminary to the grand advance puzzled the Confede- 
rates and perplexed loyal spectators. There were reconnoissances down both 
sides of the Mississippi River from Cairo, and Thomas feigned a march in force 
into East Tennessee. Meanwhile an expedition against Forts Henry and Don- 
elson' had been arranged. Halleck's troops, destined for the enterprise, were 
placed under the chief command of General U. S. Grant. Foote was sum- 
moned to the Tennessee River with his flotilla of gun-boats, and at dawn on 
the 3d of February, 1862, he was up that stream a few miles below Fort 
Henry, and Grant's army was landing from transports near. At noon on the 
6th the flotilla opened its guns on the fort. The army was then in motion to 
co-operate, but before it could reach the scene of action the post Avas in pos- 
session of Foote, by surrender. The Confederate troops outside of the fort, 
panic-stricken, fled without firing a gun. The Commander (General Tilghman), 
and less than one hundred artillerists, had made a gallant defense, but were 
compelled to yield. This, and Fort Hieman, on the opposite side of the river, 
with all their armament, became spoils of victory- — a victory most important 
in its immediate and more remote effects. It not only gave a formidable post 
into the possession of the Nationals, but it proved the efficiency of gun-boats 
on the narrow rivers of the West. The National troops were now firmly 
planted in the rear of Columbus, and there was nothing left to obstruct the 



> Page 594. 

' The National loss was 2 killed and 38 wounded. Of the latter, 29 of them were wounded 
and scalded on board the gun-boat E>isex. Captain W. D. Porter, whose boiler was exploded by a 
shot that entered it. The Confederate loss was five killed and ten wounded. 



596 



THE NATION. 



[1862 



passage of gun-boats up the Tennessee to the fertile regions of Northern Ala- 
bama, and carrying the flag of the Republic far toward the heart of the Con- 
federacy, 

The fall of Fort Henry was followed by immediate preparations for an; 
attack on Fort Donelson, a formidable work among the hills near the village 
of Dover, the capital of Stewart County, on the Cumberland River. The object 
was to reduce that sti'onghold, and then sweep over Tennessee with a large 
force into Northern Alabama. Foote had hurried back to Cairo to bring up 
his mortar-boats for the new enterprise, and Grant was equally active in pre- 







(WtHf., '^<'t 



VIEW AT FORT DONELSON.' 

paring soldiers for the work. He reorganized his army into three divisions^ 
commanded respectively by Generals John A. McClernand, C, F. Smith, and 
Lewis Wallace, and on the evening of the 12th [February, 1862] the divisions 
of the first two, which had moved from Fort Henry that morning, invested 
Fort Donelson, which was then in command of ex-Secretary Floyd,^ assisted 
by Generals Pillow^ and Buckner.* Early the next morning picket-skirmishing 
speedily developed into a general battle between the investing troops and the 



' This is a view sketched by the author in May, 1866, from the river-bank within the fort, 
overlooking the mounds of the water-batteries below, and down the river to the place where 
Poote's gun-boats lay, here indicated by the little steamboat in the distance. 

* Pages 549 and 574. ^ Page 566. ' Page 565, 



4862.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



i97 



■garrison,' in which the former were beaten and fell Lack,' determined to wait 
for the arrival of Foote's flotilla, with which was coming a portion of Wallace's 
■division. Wallace (who had been left at Fort Henry) was summoned to Fort 
Donelson by Grant, and at noon the next day he reported his whole division as 
<on the field and ready for action. Meanwhile Foote's flotilla had arrived, but 
without the mortar-boats, and during the afternoon of the 1 4th it fought the 
water-batteries and guns from others bearing on the river with great gallantry, 
until the vessels were so much injui-ed that they were withdrawn.^ 

The night of the 14th was one of anxiety in both camps. Foote hastened 
back to Cairo to have damages repaired and to bring up his mortar-boats, and 
<arrant determined to wait for his return. The Confederates in the fort held a 
•council of war, and resolved to make a sortie the next morning to rout or 
destroy the investing army, or to cut through it and escape to the open coun- 
try in the direction of Nashville. The troops selected for this desperate 
Tueasure, about ten thousand in number, were placed under Pillow and Buckner. 
Those led by the former were to strike McClernand on tlie right of the Na- 
tional line, while Buckner should fall upon Wallace's division in the center. 
The movement was attempted. McClernand, sore 
•pressed, called upon Wallace for aid. It Avas 
promptly given, and, after a desperate and gallant 
fight by all, the Confederates Avere driven back to 
'.their trenches. " I speak advisedly," wrote Hill- 
yer, Grant's aid-de-camp, to Wallace, the next 
day, with a pencil on a slip of paper, " God bless 
you ! You did save the day on the right." 
Meanwhile, Smith had been vigorously and suc- 
cessfully striking the right of the Confederates, 
and when darkness fell at evening the National 
troops were victorious, the A'anquished garrison 
were imprisoned within the lines, and their leaders 
were busied with endeavors to solve the important 
question. How shall we escape ? In a midnight conference, when it Avas found 
that they must surrender, Floyd and Pillow exhibited the greatest coAvardice. 
Only Buckner acted like a man. The other two fled from the fort,^ and left 
the latter to surrender it the next morning [February 16, 1862]. 




LEWIS WALLACE. 



' The Caronddet, Captain "Walke, of Foote's flotilla, had gallantly contended with the water- 
*batteries of the Fort. 

^ There had been a great change in the weather, and the troops, not prepared for it, suffered 
terribly from intense cold, and a lack of clothing and tents. A little snow had fallen, and insuf- 
ficient food and shelter made their sufferings most severe. 

^ Never was a little squadron exposed to a more severe fire. Twenty heavy guns were 
•trained upon it, those from the hillsides, on which the mam works of the fort lay, hurling plung- 
ing shot with awful precision and effect, when only twelve guns could reply. The four armored 
A'essels in the fight {St. -Louis, the flag-ship, Carondelet, Pittsburg, and Louisville) received in the 
aggregate no less than 141 wounds from the Confederate shot and shell, and lost 54 men killed, 
.and maimed. 

* The council of war was held at Pillow's head-quarters, in Dover. Between Floyd and Pillow 
there were criminations and recriminations, and each, fearing to fall into the hands of the Na- 
tionals, seemed to think of littie else than his personal safety. When it was decided that they 



598 T^^ NATION. [1862:. 

That Avas a happy Sabbath for the Union troops. Tliey had Avon a most 
important victory for the National cause.' Intelligence of it filled the con- 
spirators with despair, and from that time no European court entertained, 
serious thoughts of acknowledging the independence of the Confederate States^ 
or recognizing them as a nation. ** The victory produced great joy among the 
loyal people of the Republic. They and the government were satisfied that a 
withering blow had been given to the rebellion, and that henceforth its propor- 
tions would be less, and its malignity not so dangerous to the life of the 
Republic* When Fort Donelson fell, Kentucky and Missouri, and all of 
Northern and Middle Tennessee, were lost to the Confederates, and the more 
southern States, whose inhabitants expected to have the battles for their 
defense fought in the border Slave-labor States, Avere exposed to the inroads- 
of the National armies. 

Johnston noAV clearly perceived that BoAvling Green^ and Columbus' Avere 
both untenable, and that the salvation of the Confederate troops at those 
places required their immediate evacuation. He issued orders accordingly^ 
The troops at BoAvling Green marched in haste to Nashville, followed by 
Buell, and at the same time National gun-boats moved up the Cumberland to 
Clarksville, to co-operate Avith the land troops from Fort Donelson, under 



Avould be compelled to surrender, Floyd quickly said ; " Gentlemen, I cannot surrender ; you 
know my position with the Federals [his treasonable acts while in Buchanan's cabinet] : it 
wouldn't do, it wouldn't do." Pillow, whose vanity made him over-estimate his importance, took 
a similar stand, and when Floyd offered to resign the command to him, he quickly replied: "I 
will not accept it — I will never surrender myself or my command." While speaking-, he turned 
toward Buckner, who said: " I will accept, and share the fate of my command." Floyd and 
Pillow both stole away from the fort during the night, and saved themselves; and an epigram- 
matist of the day wrote concerning the former's infamous desertion of his troops, saying: — 

"The thief is a coward by Nature's law ; 

Who betrays the State, to no one is true ; 
And the brave foe at Fort Donelson saw 
Their light-fingered Floyd was light-footed too." 

' Buckner sent a flag of truce to ask upon what terms Grant would accept the surrender of 
the troops and post. Regarding them simply as rebels. Grant replied : " No terms other than ao 
unconditional surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately upon your works."' 
Buckner made a foolish reply, saying that he should feel impelled, notwithstanding " the brilliant 
success of the Confederate arms" the day before, "to accept the ungenerous and unchivalrous 
terms" proposed. This was followed by the speedy surrender of the fort, with 13,500 men 
(including the sick and wounded) as prisoners of war, with 3,000 horses, 48 field pieces, 17 heavy- 
guns, 20,000 muskets, and a great quantity of military stores. The National loss Avas estimated 
at 446 killed, 1,745 wounded, and 150 prisoners. 

^ The oliief conspirators at Richmond received the intelligence with emotions of mingled 
dismay and anger. Following so close upon the fall of Roanoke Island (page 590), it greatly- 
perplexed them. Notwithstanding Johnston tried to excuse the cowardice and perfidy of 
Pillow and Floyd, Davis ordered them to be suspended from command. 

^ At Fort Donelson was successfully begun that system of army mail service devised by Colonel 
(afterward General) A. 11. Markland, which was one of the wonders and among the most salutary- 
measures of the war. "Within one hour after the troops began to march into Fort Donelson,"' 
General Grant wrote to the author, in July, 1866, "the mail was being distributed to them from 
the mail- wagons." Under the direction of Colonel Markland, this service Avas continued through- 
out the war, linking the army with home, and keeping off that terrible liome-sickness which so 
often prostrates the volunteer soldier, physically and morallj\ For months an average of twO" 
hundred and fifty thousand mihtary letters were received at and sent from the post-office at Iha- 
National capital, daily. 

* Page 576. » Page 575. 



18d2.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 599, 

General Smith, in movements against Nashville. Meanwhile, the panic in the 
latter place became fearful. The terrified Governor (Harris) fled, Johnston's 
army passed farther southward, and on the 26th of February Nashville was 
formally surrendered by the civil authorities and the National troops took: 
possession.^ Provision w^as at once made at Washington City for civil gov-- 
ernment in Tennessee, and Andrew Johnson was appointed Provisional- 
Governor, with the military rank of Brigadier-General. He entered upon the - 
duties of his office on the 4th of March, 1862, with the avowal that he should 
see to it that "intelligent and conscious treason in high places" should be 
punished. 

Another bloodless victory soon followed the evacuation of Nashville. It 
was the taking possession by National troops, wdthout opposition, of Colum- 
bus. Beauregard was then in command of the Department of Mississippi, and 
out-ranked Polk. The former, obedient to instructions from Richmond,, 
ordered the latter to transfer his command, and as much of the munitions of" 
war as possible, from Columbus to a safer place, when Polk went to New 
Madrid, Madrid Bend, and Island Number Ten, there to prepare for defense. 












f^^s^^ggM/'^- -,^^,_, 



j^j 



ISLAND NUMBER TEN. 



Meanwhile Foote had moved down the Mississippi with a flotilla of gun-boats 
and transports, the latter bearing about two thousand men under General 
W. T. Sherman, and when they approached Columbus [March 4, 1862] they 
saw the National flag waving over its fortifications, having been planted there 
the evening before by a scouting party of Illinois troops, from Paducah. A 
garrison was left to hold the post, and Foote returned to Cairo to prepare for 
a siege of the new position of ihe Confederates, which the latter hoped to 
make impregnable. 

New Madrid, at a great bend in the river, with Island Number Ten, a few 

' Floyd and Pillow, who fled from Fort Donelson, were in command at Nashville, the order 
for their suspension not having yet reached head-quarters. As the Nationals approached they 
were again overcome with terror, when they fired the bridges over the Cumberland at Nashville, 
in defiance of the protests of the citizens, and scampered away southward by the light of the 
conflagration, leaving the more courageous Forrest with his cavalry to cover their inglorious 
flight. Floyd died miserably not long afterward, and Pillow sunk into merited obscurity. 



QQQ THE NATION. [1862. 

miles above, was a thousand miles, by the current, from New Orleans, yet it 
was now regarded as the key to the Lower Mississippi. Its importance was per- 
ceived by both parties. General McCown was placed in command there, and 
General Beauregard commanded in person at first on Island Number Ten.' 
They were there just in time to prevent the occupation of these places by the 
Nationals, for while Johnston was flying southward from Bowling Green, Gene- 
ral Pope, dispatched from St. Louis [February 22] by General Ilalleck, was press- 
ing toward New Madrid with Ohio and Illinois troops. He appeared before that 
post on the 3d of March, and found it occupied by McCown, supported by a 
Confederate flotilla of gun-boats under Captain Hollins.^ He sent to Bird's 
Point^for siege-guns, and on the 13th [March, 1862] he opened a heavy fire on the 
Confederate works and Hollins's gun-boats. That night, during a violent 
thunder-storm, the Confederates evacuated New Madrid and retired to Island 
Number Ten, with a loss unknown. Pope lost fifty-one killed and wounded. 

Island Number Ten now became the chief objective of attack and defense. 
Beauregard had thoroughly fortified it. Pope desired to cross the Mississippi 
at New Madrid with his troops, and to march over Madrid Bend and attack 
the post, while Foote should assail it from the river. He begged the latter to 
allow gun-boats to run by and come to his aid, but Foote thought it too peri- 
lous to do so, and while the navy was pounding away at the defenses of the 
Island,^ Pope was chafing with impatience to do something to help the 
besiegers. At length he caused the execution of a plan suggested by General 
Schuyler Hamilton for flanking the Island. This was the cutting of a canal 
through a swamp, from the river above the Island to a bayou that flows into 
the Mississippi at New Madrid, below the Island.' Through this transports 
and gun-boats might pass. Perceiving this, and the peril threatened by it, 
the Confederates sunk steamers in the river to prevent the passage of vessels, 
and endeavored to flee from the Island. They were intercepted and captured 
by Pope's troops under Stanly, Hamilton, and Paine ; and Island Number Ten, 
with its batteries and supports, and over 7,000 prisoners, became the spoils of 
victory for Pope and Foote.^ This was another severe blow to the Confede- 

^ At about this time Beauregard sent out a proclamation to the planters of the Mississippi 
Valley, caUing upon them to consecrate to the use of the Confederacy their church, plantation, 
and other bells, to be converted into cannon. There was a liberal response to the appeal, and the 
contributions were all sent to New Orleans. There they were found by General Butler, who 
sent them to Boston, where they were sold by auction and devoted to peaceful uses. 

" Page 582. ^ Page 566. 

■* Foote began the siege on Sunday morning, the 16th of March, and opened upon tlie Confede- 
rate works heavy shells from rifled guns and thirteen-inch mortars. " Island Number Ten," 
wrote Foote to the Secretary of the Navy on the 19th of March, " is harder to conquer than Colum- 
bus, as the island shores are lined with forts, each fort commanding the one about it." 

* This canal was twelve miles in length, and was cut in the space of nineteen days, half the 
distance through a growth of heavy timber. Tlie width of the canal through this timber was 
fifty feet, and in some places the trees were sawed off four feet under water. It was a wonderful 
monument to the engineering skill and indomitable perseverance of the Americans. On the night 
before its completion [April 3], Pope's wishes concerning the aid of gun-boats were partially 
gratified. The gallant Commander Walke performed the perilous feat of running by the batteries 
with the Oarondelet, at midnight, during a heavy thunder-storm. This, with steamers that came 
through the canal, enabled Pope to operate on the river below New Madrid, in connection with 
Foote. 

^ The number of prisoners taken by Foote and Pope together was 7,273, including three 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION 



601 



rates, from which they never recovered. They almost despaired. It seemed 
probable that Memphis, one of their strongholds on the Mississippi, where 
they liad .mmense workshops and armories, would soon share the fate of Co- 
lumbus, and that the great river would be patroled by National gun-boats 
from Cairo to New Orleans, and the rich trans-Mississippi country be separated 
from the rest of the Confederacy. Panic prevailed all the way down to the 
Gulf, for already, as we have seen, Curtis had broken the power of the Con- 
federates in Arkansas,' and a heavy force was making its way up the Tennes- 
see River, in the direction of Alabama. 

Grant newly organized his foi'ces after the capture of Fort Donelson, and 
made vigorous preparations for ascending the Tennessee from Fort Henry, 
where General Wallace was in command, and where head-quarters were tem- 
porarily established. Immediately 
after the fall of Fort Henry'^ Grant 
had sent three gun-boats up the Ten- 
nessee, under Lieutenant-Commander 
Phelps, who penetrated the country 
as far as Florence, in Alabama. 
Phelps reported the existence of much 
loyal feeling in that region, and this 
made the Unionists anxious to push 
on and occupy the country. That 
movement was now attempted. 
Corinth, on the Memphis and Charles- 
ton railway, was the grand objective, 
the possession of which, with the rail- 
ways running east and west, and 
north and south, and intersecting 
there, would give immense power to the army. Troops in large number were 
sent up the Tennessee in transports to Savannah and its vicinity, and some, 
under General Sherman, went much farther up the river. Finally, at the 
beginning of April [1862], the main body of Grant's army was encamped 
"between Pittsburg Landing and Shiloh Meeting-House, eighteen or twenty 
miles from Corinth. At the latter place Beauregard had been for some time 
gathering an opposing force, and at the period in question General A. S. John- 
ston was there, and in chief command. 

Yv'^hile this movement up the Tennessee was occurring. General Buell's army 
was slowly making preparations to march southward, overland, and join Grant's 
at Savannah. He left Nashville late in March, leaving General Negley in com- 
mand there. A part of his force, under the energetic General Mitchel, pushed 
rapidly southward, captured Huntsville [April 11], on the Memphis and 
Charleston railway, and secured control of that road for a hundred miles, 

generals and 273 field and company officers. The spoils of victory were nearly 20 batteries, with 
123 cannon and mortars, the former ranging from 32 to lOO-ponnders; 7,000 small arms; many 
hundred horses and mules; an immense amount of ammunition, and four steamers afloat. 
' Page 592. "^ Page ^95. 




U. S. GRANT. 



(302 THE NATION [1862. 

between Tuscumbia on the west and Stevenson on the east. Mitchel had thus 
placed his little array midway between Corinth and Nashville, opened commu- 
nication with Buell, and controlled the navigation of the Tennessee for more 
than one hundred miles. His swift marches and his conquests had been accom- 
plished without the loss of a single life.' 

Meanwhile very important events had occurred on the Tennessee River. The- 
bulk of the National army, under Grant, was encamped, as we have observed, 
between Pittsburg Landing and Shiloh Meeting-IIouse.^ The division of Gen- 
eral Lewis Wallace was stationed at Crump's Landing, below, to watch the- 
movements of the Confederates west of the Tennessee in that region. On 
the memorable Sunday morning, the 6th of April [1862], the main army, lying 
near the river, stretched across the roads leading from Corinth to Pittsburgh 
and Hamburg Landings, from the Snake Creek to the Lick Creek. It was com- 
manded by Generals Sherman, McClernand, Prentiss, W. H. L. Wallace, and 
Hurlbut. At that time the Confederate forces under General A. S. Johnston, 
led by Generals Beauregard, Polk, Bragg, Hardee, and Breckenridge, as prin- 
cipal commanders, had advanced from Corinth to a j^oint Avithin four miles of 
the National camp, without being discovered. Almost the first intimatiorn 
given of their near approach was their vigorous attack, early on that beautiful 
spring morning, first upon Sherman, and then upon Prentiss, on his left. The 
columns of the latter were broken up, and the general and a larger portion of 
his men were captured. All day long the battle raged. Grant had come 
upon the field early from his head-quarters below, and directed the storm of 
conflict on the part of the Nationals as well as he could, but night found his 
army terribly smitten and pushed back to the verge of the Tennessee River, 
then full to the brim with a spring flood, and Beauregard, who had succeeded 
Johnston, slain on the field that day, telegraphing a shout of victory to 
his employers at Richmond.^ One more blow, vigorously given, might have 
driven the Nationals into the turbulent waters, or caused their captivity. A 
blow was given, but so feebly, on account of prompt and effective responses by 
two gun-boats {Tyler and Lexington), and some heavy guns hastily placed in 
battery, that the Nationals stood firm.'' 

' In a stirring address to liis troops, Mitcliel said: "You have struck blow after blow with. 
a rapidity unparalleled. Stevenson fell, sixty miles to the east of Huntsville. Decatur and Tus- 
cumbia have been in like manner seized, and are now occupied. In three daj^s you have extended 
your front of operations more than one hundred miles, and your morning guns at Tuscumbia may 
now be heard by your comrades on the battle-field made glorious by their victory before Corinth."' 
This address was on the IGth of April, when the battle of Shiloh, recorded in the text on the- 
next page, had been fought and won by tlie Nationals. 

* Page 601. 

^ The following is a copy of the dispatch, dated "Battle-field of Shiloh, April 6, 1862: We- 
have this morning attacked the enemy in a strong position in front of Pittsburg, and after a severe- 
battle often hours, thanks to Almighty God, gained a complete victory, driving the enemy from, 
every position. The loss on both sides is heavy, including our commander-in-chief. General 
Albert Sidney Johnston, who fell gallantly leading his troops into the thickest of the tight." 

* During a lull in the battle, toward evening, three light earthworks were thrown up, in 
semicircular form, half a mile back from the river-bluff, and twentj^-two heavy guns were mounted, 
on them. The gun-boats had been brought up to the mouth of a little creek that traverses a 
ravine at Pittsburg Landing, and up that hollow they hurled 7-inch shells and 64-pound shot in 
curves that caused them to drop into the midst of the Confederates. At nine o'clock in tha 
evening the battle ceased. 



1862.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION.- 



605- 



Buell had been slowly advancing to join Grant. His vanguard appeared 
on the opposite side of the Tennessee toward the evening of the day of battle. 
These crossed ; and all night long other battalions of Buell's army were com- 
ing up the river. At midnight General Lewis Wallace, who had been ordered 
up from Crump's Landing, arrived with his division. Grant's army was now 
safe. The fruits of victory were snatched from Beauregard. Before s-unrise next 
morning Wallace opened the contest anew on the Confederate left, where Beau- 
regard commanded in person. Others speedily co-operated, and again the bat- 
tie became general along the whole line. The Confederates were steadily 
pressed back by a superior force, all the while fighting most gallantly. They 
were pushed through and beyond the National camps seized by them on Sun- 
day morning. Perceiving that all w^as lost, they fled, in the midst of a cold 
storm of rain and sleet, to the heights of Monterey, in the direction of Corinth,, 
covered by a strong rear-guard under Breckenridge,' and there encamped. 
They had lost over 10,000 
men in battle, and full 
300 of the wounded died 
during that terrible re- 
treat of nine miles. ° Fif- 
teen thousand of the 
Nationals were killed, 
wounded, and prisoners, 
and the hospital steamers 
that went down the Ten- 
nessee were crowded with 
the sick and maimed. 
The slain troops were 
speedily buried, the dead 
horses were burned, and 
every sanitary precaution was observed. The Confederates Avere not pursued 
far in their flight; and both parties, one on the battle-field and the other at 
Corinth, prepared for a renewal of the struggle. 

Beauregard's army Avas so shattered, that he sent an imploring cry from 
Corinth to Richmond for help.^ The way seemed opened for his immediate 
destruction, and Grant was anxious to walk vigorously in it. But his superior^ 
General Halleck, who noAV came from St. Louis [x\pril 12] and took command 




BURNING HORSES ON SHU 



> His force Avas about 12,000 men. Beauregard said to him, "This retreat must not be a. 
rout. You must hold the enemy back, if it requires the loss of j-our last man." 

^ An eye-witness Avro to: — "I passed long Avagon-trains tilled with Avounded and dying sol-- 
diers, Avitliout even a blanket to shield them from the driving sleet and hail." Beauregard 
reported his loss at 1,728 killed, 8,012 wounded, and 957 missing— total, 10.697 Grant reported 
his loss 1,735 killed, 7,882 Avounded, and 3,956 prisoners— total, 13,573. Subsequent statements 
show that the loss on each side Avas about 15,000. 

= He said he could not then muster more than 35,000 effective men, but that Earl Van Dora, 
[see page 592] might join him in a few days Avith 15,000. He asked for re-enforcements, and 
Baid. — "If defeated here Ave lose the Mississippi Valley, and probably our cause." This dis- 
patch, Avritten in cipher, General Mitchel intercepted at Huntsville, when he seized the telegraplv 
oEBce there. 



604 



THE NATION. 



[18G2. 



of the victorious army, thought otherwise, and the impatient troops loitered 
near Corinth until their foe had fully prepared for another contest. Twenty 
days after the battle, the Grand Army of Tennessee, as it was now called, 
moved [April 2*7] nine miles, and a week later [May 3d] it moved near to 
Corinth, making vigorous use all the while of pick-ax and spade. On that 
day troops under Generals Paine and Palmer pushed on to Farmington, east 
of Corinth, and fought and conquered Confederates at an out-post there, but 
they in turn were driven back to their lines. For twenty-seven days longer 
the Nationals kept digging and piling the earth, in a siege of the Confederates, 
who were every day growing stronger, and continually annoying the besiegers 
\>j sorties. Finally, on the 29th of May, the Confederates were expelled from 
their advanced batteries, and Halleck prepared for a sanguinary battle the 
next morning. All that night the vigilant ears of his sentinels heard the con- 
tinuous roar of moving cars at Corinth, and their lips reported to their chief. 

At dawn [May 30] skirmishers were sent 
out, but no foe confronted them. Then 
the earth was shaken by a series of ex- 
j)losions, and dense smoke arose from the 
bosom of Corinth. " I cannot explain 
it," said Halleck to an inquiry made by 
Sherman, when told to " advance and 
feel the enemy." There was no enemy 
there to feel. Beauregard had evacxxated 
Corinth during the night, burned and 
blew up what he could not carry away, 
and after an exciting flight before pur- 
suers for a short distance, the ridiculous 
boaster' gathered his scattered ti-oops at 
Tupelo, many miles southward of 
Corinth, and there left them (as he sup- 
loosed temporarily) in charge of Bragg, while he retired to Bladen Springs, in 
Alabama, to find repose and health.'' Halleck took possession of Corinth, and 
•shortly afterward he was called to Washington City, to perform the duties of 
Oeneral-in-Chief of all the armies of the Republic. 

Meanwhile there had been stirring events on the shores of the Mississippi. 
Soon after the capture of New Madrid and Island Number Ten,^ Commodore 
Foote went down the river with his flotilla, and General Pope's army on 




p. G. T. BEAUREGARD. 



1 On the 8th of May Beauregard issued a pompous address to his army, then composed of his 
own and the forces of Yan Dorn. "Shall we not drive back to Tennessee," he said, "the pre- 
■-sumptuous mercenaries collected for our subjugation ? One more manly effort, and, trustuig in 
'God and the justness of our cause, we shall recover more than we lately lost. Let the sound of 
•our victorious guns be re-echoed by those of Virginia on the l^istoric battle-field at Yorktown." 
On that day the Confederates fled from Yorktown before McClellan's troops. 

^ Jefferson Davis, whose will was now law, took this occasion to get rid of Beauregard, and 
put Bragg in permanent command of the army. He "passionately declared," said the Confede- 
late General Jordan, that Beauregard should not be reinstated, " though all the world should urge 
'3iim to the measure." 

^ Page 599. 



1862.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



605 




A MORTAR-BOAT. 



transports, to attemj^t the caj^ture of Memphis. At Fort Pillow, on the first 
Chickasaw blufis, eighty miles above Memphis by the river, the expedition 
was confronted by a Confederate flotilla under Ilollins,' and three thou- 
sand troops under M. Jeff". Thompson.' The post was besieged by Foote 
on the 14th of April, with gun-boats and mortar-boats, while Pope's troops^ 

obeyed Halleck's call to Shiloh. The • - 

navy w^as left to do the work ; but there 
was no serious fighting until the 10th of 
May, when IloUins attacked the flotilla. A 
sharp fight ensued between the armored 
vessels, while the heavy guns of the fort 
assisted Hollins, but he was repulsed; 
and for more than a fortnight afterward 
the two flotillas lay Avatching each other. 
Then a " ram" squadron under Colonel 
Charles Ellet, Jr.^ joined the National 
flotilla, and preparations w^ere made for 
another battle, when, on the night of the 
4th of June, the Confederates, having 
heard of the retreat of Beauregard from Corinth, fled from Fort Pillow, fleet 
and army, as fast as steam could carry them, and took position for the defense 
of Memphis. Commodore Davis (Foote's successor'*) followed, and in a very 
severe engagement with the Confederate flotilla in front of Memphis [June 6, 
1862] was victorious. Thompson and his troops fled, and the National stand- 
ard was soon seen floating in the air over the affi-ighted town. This event 
was soon followed by the entrance and occupation of the city by troops under 
General Wallace, fresh from the successful siege of Corinth. 

All Kentucky, Western Tennessee, and Northern Mississippi and Alabama, 
were now in the possession of the National authorities, and it was confidently 
expected that East Tennessee would almost immediately be in the same posi- 
tion. When Buell joined Mitchel, after the close of the siege of Corinth, the 
latter urged his superior to march directly into and occupy that region. But 
Buell would not consent, and various eflforts which Mitchel had made, pre- 
paratory to such an expedition, were rendered almost fruitless. His com- 
manders had been keeping danger from his rear and making the foe on his 
front exceedingly circumspect. Negley, Turchin, Lytic, and others had been 
operating in the region of the railway between Decatur and Columbia ; and the 
first-named had climbed over the mountains northeast of Stevensen, drove the 



' Page 600. " Page 573. 

' This squadron had been suggested by Colonel Ellet, who was the eminent civil engineer 
who constructed the Niagara Suspension Bridge, and under his superintendence the rams 
had been built. They were river boats, some with stern wheels and some with side 
wheels, whose bows were strengthened by additions of heavy timber, and covered with plates; 
of iron. 

* At the siege of Fort Donelson Commodore Foote's ankle had received a severe contusion 
from a piece of falling timber. It became so painful, that on the 9th of May he was compelled ta 
withdraw from active service. On retiring, he left the command of the flotilla with Captain C. H. 
Davis. 



606 



THE NATION. 



[1862. 



■Confederates before him near Jjisper, and on the 7th of June [1862] aj^peared 
on the Tennessee River, opposite Chattanooga. With a little help, that key 
to East Tennessee and Northern Georgia might have been captured and held, 
"but it was refused ; and ten days afterward, when the Confederates, without a 
struggle, evacuated Cumberland Gaj), the " Gibraltar of the Mountains," and 
allowed General George W. Morgan, with a few Ohio and Kentucky troops, 
to occupy it, Buell refused to march in at the open door, to the relief of East 
Tennessee, and the persecuted inhabitants of that loyal region were compelled 
to wait much longer for deliverance. The cautious Buell and the fiery MitcheP 

did not work well together, and the 
latter was transferred to another field 
of duty. For a short time now there 
was a lull in the storm of war westward 
of the Alleghanies, but it was only the 
calm before a more furious tempest. 

Let us now turn to a consideration 
of events on the coast of North Caro- 
lina, where we left Burnside and the 
accompanying naval force,^ preparing 
for more conquests. That expedition 
appeared in the Neuse River, below 
New Berne, on the evening of the 12th 
of March [1862], and early the next 
morning about fifteen thousand land 

ORMSBY M. MITCHEL. ^ 

troops Avent ashore, and marched toward 
the defenses of that city, which were in charge of a force under General 
Branch. At daylight on the 14th the Nationals moved to the attack in three 
columns, commanded respectively by Generals Foster, Reno, and Parke, the 
gun-boats in the river, under Commodore Rowan, co-operating. A very severe 
"battle ensued, in which the Nationals were conquerors. Pressed on all sides 
by a su23erior force, the Confederates fled from the field across the Trent, 
burning the bridges behind them, and escaped, with the exception of the killed 
and wounded and two hundred made prisoners.'' The Nationals took posses- 




' With the sanction of General Buell, Mitchel sent out an important expedition toward the 
middle of April. It was composed of twentj^-two picked men, led by J. J. Andrews, and their 
duty was to destroy the railway between Chattanooga and Atlanta. They went in detach- 
ments to Marietta, in Georgia, where they joined, and at a station a few miles northward of that 
town they seized the train in which they were traveling, while tlie conductor and passengers 
were at brealcfast, and started for Chattanooga, doing what damage they could to the road. They 
were pursued, and were finally so closely pressed that they abandoned the train and fled to the 
woods. Some escaped, some were captured, and nine of them, including Andrews, the leader, 
were hung. 

* Page 590. 

^ The National loss was about one hundred killed and four hundred wounded. The loss of 
the Confederates, in killed and wounded, was less. The spoils of victory were important, con- 
sisting of the town and harbor of New Berne; eight batteries, mounting forty-six heavy guns; 
three batteries of light artillery, of six guns each ; a number of sailing vessels ; wagons, horses, 
and mules ; a large quantitj' of ammunition and army supplies ; the entire camp equipage of the 
Confederates, and much turpentine, rosin, and cotton. Most of the white inhabitants fled to 
Goldsboro', on the Weldon Railway. 



1862.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. Q()) 

sion of tlie city of New Benie, and tlieu proceeded to attempt the capture of 
J'ort Macon, at the entrance to the harbor of Beaufort. The expedition was 
intrusted to tlie command of General Foster, who effected a lodgment on 
Bogue Island, a long sand-spit on which Fort Macon stands, and from bat- 
teries which he planted there he began a bombardment of the fort on the 
moi'ning of the 25th of April, Some gun-boats, under Commander Lockwood, 
participated in the attack. At four o'clock in the afternoon the garrison gave 
tokens of submission, and early the next day the fort and its occupants were 
surrendered to the Nationals.^ At the same time troops under General Reno 
were quietly taking possession of important places along the waters of Albe- 
marle Sound and threatening Norfolk in the rear. At a place called South 
Mills, near Camden Court House, Reno's troops encountered the Confederates 
in a sharp engagement, and defeated them. Winton, at the head of the 
Chowan ; Plymouth, at tlie mouth of the Roanoke, and Washington, at the 
liead of the Pamlico River, were all seized and occupied by the National 
troops. Burnside now held almost undisputed sway over the coast region, from 
the Dismal Swamp nearly to the Cape Fear River, until called to the Virginia 
Peninsula, in July, to assist McClellan. 

While Burnside and Rowan were operating on the coast of North Carolina, 
Sherman and Dupont^ were engaged in important movements on the coasts of 
South Carolina and Georgia, having for their first object the capture of Fort 
Pulaski, on Cockspur Island, near the mouth of the Savannah River. Bat- 
teries were planted on Big Tybee Island, under the skillful direction of General 
Q. A. Gillmore, so as to command the fort;^ and on the 10th of April [1862] 

1 Burnside made his head-quarters at the fine old Stanley mansion in tlie suburbs of New 
Berne. Almost before the smoke of battle was dissipated, tlie Christian spirit of tlie friends of 

the government was made conspicuous in acts of _^ ^ __ _^^^^^ 

benevolence. Vincent Colyer, a citizen of New ^^^^^=^- ""^^^B^^^^^^ 

York, and originator of the Christian Commission 
of the army, was with the expedition on an errand 
of mercy. Under the sanction of Burnside, he dis- 
tributed to the sick and wounded the generous 
contributions of the loyal citizens of the North, and 
assumed a fostering care of the poor and ignorant 
colored people, from whose limbs the hand of the 
victor had just unloosed the shackles of hopeless 
slavery. He opened evening schools, and had over 
•eight hundred eager pupils, wlien Edward Stanley, a 
North Carolinian, who had been appointed Military 
Governor of the State, making use of one of the 
barbarous slave-laws of that commonwealth, which 
made it " a criminal oftense to teacli the blacks to 
read," closed them. Stanley also made zealous ef- 
forts to return fugitive slaves to their masters; and 
the hopes of that down-trodden race in that region, colter's head-quarters. 

which were so delightfully given in promises, were 
suddenly extinguished. Stanley's administration was happilj^ a short one. 

^ The fruits of the victory'were the fort and five hundred prisoners, the command of tlio 
important harbor of Beaufort, "twenty thousand pounds of gunpowder, and a large amount of other 
ordnance stores. 

' Page 582. 

* The planting of these batteries, all things considered, was a wonderful feat of engineering 
skiU. The island is a marsh, and the armament had to be carried over it on causeways built with 
great labor. "No one," said Gillmore, in his report, "can form any but a faint conception of the 




08 



THE NATION. 



[1862, 



^Se 



General Hunter, then in command of the Department, summoned the garri- 
son to surrender. It was refused, and thirty-six heavy rifled cannon and 
,^^ _ mortars, constituting- 

— =-- ^Jf :_ eleven batteries, opened 

^^^ '^^w»i^to% ^-" - -^ fire upon it. The bom- 

^^ bardment continued un- 

til late the next day, 
when the fort was so 
shattered and its maga- 
zines so exposed to fiery 
missiles, that it was un- 
tenable.' On the morn- 
ing of the 12th, the 
fort, Avith its garrison 
of three hundred men 
and considerable spoil, 
was suri-endered to the- 
Nationals. The battle 
had been a hard-fought 
but almost bloodless 
one.^ The victory was 
important, for it enabled the Nationals to close the port of Savannah against 
blockade-runners.^ 

While Gilhnore and Viele were besieging Fort Pulaski, Commodore Dupont 
and General Wright were making easy conquests on the coast of Florida. 
They captured Fort Clinch, on the northern end of Amelia Island, early in 
February [1862], and this was the first of the old National fortifications 
" repossessed" by the government. The Confederates fled from the fort, and 
from the town of Fernandina near. They abandoned other forts along the 
coast in the same way, and the Nationals took possession of them. A flotilla 
of gun-boats and transports, with troops, under Lieutenant Thomas Holdup 
Stevens, was sent up the St. John's River to capture Jacksonsville (March 11),^ 
and was successful. At about the same time Commander C, R, P, Rosrers 




FORT PULASKI BREACHED. 



herculean labor by which mortars of eight and a half tons weight, and colurabiads but a trifle 
lighter, were moved in the dead of night over a narrow causeway bordered by swamps on each 
side, and liable at any moment to be overturned and buried in the mud beyond reach." The 
causeways were built of poles and planks, and the guns were placed in battery on heavy plank 
platforms. 

' Ten of the guns of the fort were dismounted; and so destructive of masonry had been the 
Parrott projectiles, that there was imminent danger of their penetrating the magazine. Some of 
these projectiles went through six or seven feet of solid brick wall I 

■■* The assailing troops were under the immediate command of General Yiele. He had but one 
man killed. The spoils were, the fort, forty-seven heavy guns, forty thousand pounds of gun- 
powder, and a large supply of fixed ammunition and commissary stores. 

^ We have seen [page 561] how the British government proclaimed its neutrality at the 
beginning. British subjects at once entered into the dishonorable business of violating the 
blockade, not only declared [page 560], but well sustained by force, and supplying the insurgents 
with arms, ammunition, and necessaries of every kind. Fast-sailing steamers were built for the dur- 
pose, and painted a graj' color, so as not to be distinguished in even a light fog. They frequently 
eluded the blockaders, and rendered great service to the enemies of our government. 



1862.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



609 



took possession of St. Augustine ; and the Confederates abandoned Pensacola 
and the fortifications on the main opposite Fort Pickens. Dupont returned to 
Port Royal at the close of March, and found Sherman in possession of Edisto 
Island, well up toward Charleston. And so it was, that before the first anni- 
versary of the fall of Fort Sumter, the whole Atlantic coast, from Cape Ilat- 
teras to Perdido Bay, excepting the harbor of Charleston and its immediate 
surroundings, had been abandoned by the insurgents. 

Turning again to Hampton Roads, we see General Butler there at the head 
of another expedition.' He had completed his recruiting in New England,* 
and on the 23d of February [1862] he received orders, as commander of tlie 
Department of the Gulf, to co-operate with the navy, first in the capture of 
New Orleans and its appi'oaches, and then in the reduction of Mobile, Galves- 
ton, and Baton Rouge, with the ultimate design of occupying Texas. On the 
25th of February he sailed from Hampton Roads with nearly 14,000 men; 
and thirty days later he re-embarked on Ship Island, off the coast of Missis- 
sippi, in the Gulf of Mexico. It was already in possession of National troops, 
under General Phelps, and a naval force was there under Commodores Farragut 
and Bailey. With these oflScers Butler arranged a plan of operations against 
New Orleans. A fleet of bomb-vessels 
under Commander David D. Porter had 
"been prepared to co-operate with the 
forces which rendezvoused at Ship 
Island, and early in April an extensive 
armament was in the Mississippi River,^ 
prepared to attack Forts Jackson and 
St. Philip, on the banks of that stream, 
at a sharp bend, seventy-five miles above 
the passes of the river into the Gulf 

General Mansfield Lovell, formerly a 
New York politician, was in command 
at New Orleans and of its defenses, 
among which were the forts just named.* 
He and the people of that region sup- 
posed these defenses to be impregnable,' 
and they rested in fancied security until late in April, Avhen startling events 
undeceived them. 

All things were in readiness for an assault on the forts on the 1 7th [April, 
1862], and a battle with these fortifications began on the morning of the 18th, 




D. D. PORTER. 



' Page 579. " Page 580. 

' The fleets of Farragiit and Porter comprised forty-seven armed vessels, eight of which were 
•large and powerful steam sloops of war. Butler's troops, composed of Massachusetts, Connecti- 
cut, Indiana, "Wisconsin, and Michigan men, were borne on five transports. 

* Fort Jackson was built by the government. Fort St. Philip was an old Spanish work, 
which figured somewhat in the war of 1812. They were near each other, on opposite sides of 
the river. The general command of these, and other river defenses below New Orleans, was 
intrusted to General J. R. Duncan, formerly an office-holder in the city of New York. 

' A leading newspaper said: — "Our only fear is that the Northern invaders may not appear. 
We have made such extensive preparations to receive them, that it were vexatious if their invio- 



610 



THE NATION. 



[1862. 



Farragut commanding the squadron of gun-boats, and Porter the mortar fleet, 
the former being the chief officer. Soon perceiving but little chance for redu- 
cing the forts, Farragut made arrangements to run by them with his gun-boats. 
This was attempted on the night of the 23d, the mortar-boats keeping their 
position and covering the advance with their fire. It was a most perilous 
undertaking. Obstructions below the fort were first removed, and then, under 
the heavy fire of the Confederates, the squadron moved up the swift current 
(the Mississippi was full to the brim), and soon encountered a formidable fleet 
of rams and gun-boats lying just above the forts. One of the most terrific 
naval fights on record ensued,' in which Farragut and commanders Bailey and 
Boggs were most conspicuous. It resulted in victory for the Nationals. 
Within the space of an hour and a half after the National vessels left their 
anchorage, the forts were passed, the struggle had occm-red, and eleven of the 
Confederate vessels, or nearly the whole of their fleet, were destroyed.' The 
National loss was thirty men killed, and not more than one hundred and 
twenty-five wounded. All of Farragut's vessels which had passed the forts, 
thirteen in number, rendezvoused at the Quarantine, which was the first gov- 
ernment property in Louisiana " repossessed " by the National forces. 

While this desperate battle was raging, the land troops under Butler 
were preparing to perform their part in the drama. They were landed in 
the rear of Fort St. Philip, and in small boats they made their way to the 
Quarantine on the Mississippi [April 27] through narrow and shallow bayous* 
Their appearance alarmed the Confederates, and a mutiny in the garrison of 
Fort Jackson, caused by their menace, compelled the surrender of the forts.* 
Meanwhile Farragut had gone up to New Orleans with his fleet. He had been 
preceded by intelligence of disasters below, and there was a fearful panic in 
the city. Four millions of specie was sent away by the banks, and a vast 
amount of private property, with many citizens, was soon on the wing. 

cible armada escapes the fate wo have in store for it." In and around New Orleans was a force 
of about 10,000 armed men. In order to deceive the people, it was given out by the authorities 
that there were more than 30,000 troops ready for the defense of the city; and the redoubtable 
HoUins was spoken of as "a Nelson in his way !" 

* "Combine," said Major BeU, of Butler's staff, who was present, "all that yon have ever 

heard of thunder, and add to it all you 
have ever seen of lightning, and you 
have, perhaps, a conception of the 
scene." And all this noise and destruc- 
tive energy — blazing fire-rafts sent 
down upon the current to destroy the 
National vessels ; the floating volcanoes 
sending forth fire, and smoke, and bolts 
of death, and the thundering forts and 
ponderous rams — were all crowded, in 
the gloom of night, within the space of 
a narrow river. 

■■' Among the vessels destroyed was 
the ram Manassas, which was set on 
fire, and went roaring down the stream. 
Finally, like a huge amphibious mon- 
ster, it gave a plunge, and disappeared in the turbulent waters. 

* The number of prisoners, including some taken at the Quarantine, was about 1,000. The 
entire loss of the Nationals, from the beginning of this contest imtil the capture of New '^-'—"~ 
was 40 killed and 177 wounded. 




[ANASSAS" ON FIRE. 




1862J LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. QH 

Women wero <een in the streets crying, "Burn the city! burn the city!" 
Vehicles werr« everywhere observed carrying cotton to the levee to be 
destroyed; and when, on the 25th, Farragut, with nine vessels, approachecl 

the town, a sheet 

of flame and pall ^^^^ ~"^=^ 

of smoke, caused 

by the burning of 

cotton, sugar, and 

other property, 

was seen along the 

levee a distance of ^^ 

five miles.' The i 

city was utterly 

defenseless. The ^ 

troops had mostly 

fled, and Farragut 

held the rebellious 

citizens in check by the fear of his shells,'' until the arrival of General Butler 

with his troops on the first of May, These were landed. The General made 

his head-quarters at the St. Charles Hotel, and there, in conference with the 

city authorities and some leading citizens, he foreshadowed a policy that proved 

efiectual in maintaining order. By the most vigorous action the rebellious 

spirit of leading politicians was subdued, the refractory were punished, the 

poor were relieved, and the peaceful were protected.^ The capture of New 

' More than a dozen large ships, some of them laden with cotton, and as many magnificent 
eteam-boats, with unfinished gun-boats and other vessels, were seen in flames. In this confla- 
gration no less than 15,000 bales of cotton, valued at $1,500,000, were consumed. 

* Captain Bailey was sent ashore with a flag to demand the surrender of the city, and the 
taking down of the Confederate flag from the government custom-house and mint. This was 
refused, when a force landed, and unfurled the National flag over the mint. As soon as the force 
retired, some young men, led bj^ a notorious gambler named Mumford, pulled it down and dragged 
it in derision through the streets. When Butler, who arrived soon afterward and took command, 
heard of this, he wrote to the Secretary of War, saying: — ''This outrage will be punished in 
such manner as in my judgment will caution both the perpetrators and abettors of the act, so 
that they shall fear the stripes if they do not reverence the stars of our banner." Mumford was 
afterward active in inciting a mob to violence, when he was arrested, tried for and convicted of 
treason by a court-martial, and hung. 

^ The Mayor of the city, John T, Monroe, one of the most violent of the Secessionists, wai? 
very refractory for a while, but, with all others like him, he was soon compelled to be quiet. 
Butler discovered a list of subscribers, composed of bankers, merchants, and other wealthy citi- 
aens, to a fund for carrying on the rebellion. These he assessed for the benefit of the poor, to 
the amount of twenty-five per cent, on their subscription. Foolish women, of the wealthy and 
rebellious class, defied the military authority ; and one of these, with the low manners of tho 
degraded of her sex, deliberately spat m the faces of two officers in the street. Forbearance was 
no longer a virtue, and Butler issued an order which effectually cured the growing evil. It pub- 
licly directed the treatment of women, so acting, to be such as would be given to the abandoned 
of their sex.* This order, which was perverted and misrepresented, produced the most intense 

* The followins is a copy of the document called the " Woman Order," dated New Orleans, May 15, 1862:- - 
" General Order ^o. 23: 

" As the officers and soldiers of the United States have been subject to repeated insults from the women (call- 
ing themselves ladies) of New Orleans, in return for the most scrntiulous non-interference i nd courtesy on our 
part, it is ordered that hereafter, when any female shall, by word, gesture, or movement, insult or show contempt 
lor any officer or soldier of the United States, she shall be regarded and held liable to be treated as a womm of 
the town plying her avocation. 

" By command of 

Major-General Butlek. 
"Qkobgb C. Stbong, Assistant Adjutant- General, Chief of Staff." 



612 



THE NATION. 



[1862. 



Orleans was the heaviest blow the Confederacy had yet received, and for 
awhile it staggered under its infliction.' 

Let us now return to a consideration of the Army of the Potomac, which 
'we left in a quiet condition after the little flurry at Drainsville. 

At the beginning of 1862, when the Grand Army numbered full 200,000 
«ien, the prospect of its advance seemed more remote than ever, for the fine 

autumn weather had been succeeded by 
storms and frost, and the roads were 
becoming wretched in Virginia. The 
people were impatient and the Presi- 
dent was dissatisfied. He could get no 
satisfaction from the General-in-Chief 
(McClellan) when he inquired why that 
army did not move. He therefore 
summoned [January 10, 1862] Generals 
McDowell and Franklin to a conference 
with himself and cabinet, for he had 
resolved that something must be done 
by the Army of the Potomac, either 
with or without the General-in-Chief 
GEO. B. M'cLELLAN. ^^^^^r confercnccs were held, in which 

McClellan participated ; and in a gene- 
ral order on the 27th of January, the President directed a simultaneous for- 
ward movement of all the " land and naval forces of the United States against 
the insurgent forces." This order sent a thrill of joy through every loyal 
heart. It was heightened by another order, directing McClellan to form all 
of the disposable forces of the army, after providing for the safety of Wash- 
ington, into an expedition for operating against the Confederates at Manassas. 
But the General-in-Chief had other plans, and, instead of obeying, he remon- 
strated. He proposed to take his army to Richmond, by way of the Chesa- 
peake Bay and the peninsula between the York and James Rivers, instead of 
falling upon the Confederates at Manassas. Discussioa followed. A council 
of officers decided in favor of McClellan's plan. The President dissented from 
their views, but acquiesced in their decision. Orders were issued for the move- 
ment. Still there was delay, and finally, on the 8th of March, the Executive 
issued an order for the army to advance by the Chesapeake as early as the 1 8th 
of that month. 

At that moment events were occurring which caused a material modifica- 
tion of the plans of the General-in-Chief The Confederates suddenly evacuated 
Manassas [March 8 and 9] and hastened toward Richmond. The Army of the 




.excitement throughout the Confederacy, and Davis issued a proclamation of outlawry against 
Butler. 

' " It annihilated us in Louisiana," said a Confederate historian of the war, " diminished our 
resources and supphes by tiie loss of one of the greatest grain and cattle countries within the 
limits of the Confederacy, gave to the enemy the Mississippi River, with all its means of naviga- 
tion, for a base of operations, and finally led, by plain and irresistible conclusion, to our virtual 
abandonment of the great and fruitful Valley of the Mississippi." 



1862.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. gj^ 

Potomac followed as far as the deserted post, and some cavalry a little beyond ;, 
and the loyal people rejoiced because the march on Richmond had begun. 
They were instantly disappointed. The whole Grand Army of the Potomac 
was ordered back, and the few Confederates who had been keeping it in check 
for months' were allowed to make their way peacefully to Richmond, and there 
prepare to hold that grand army in check for many months at another point. 
The government was now satisfied that the burden of care which had been 
laid upon the General-in-Chief was greater than he was able to bear, and the 
President kindly relieved him [March 11, 1862] of much of it, by dividing the 
great labor of command, and leaving in McClellan's charge only the Army of 
the Potomac' 

The evacuation of Manassas was simultaneous with the sudden appearance 
of a new naval power in Hampton Roads, the operations of which formed 
one of the causes for a modification of McClqllan's plans for moving against 
Richmond. It was the notable iron gun-boat called the Mouitor, constructed, 
on a novel plan for oiFensive and defensive war.^ It was then known that 
the Merrimack^ sunk at Norfolk,'' had been raised and converted into a 
formidable iron-clad warrior. Its speedy appearance in Hampton Roads- 
was expected, and dreaded, because it would greatly imperil the wooden 
vessels of the government there. On the 8th of March it suddenly made its 
appearance. It moved directly upon the sailing frigates Congress and Gum- 
herland, at the mouth of the James River, and destroyed them. It also- 
attacked other armed vessels, and then seemed to take a little rest for the task.- 
of utterly destroying the warriors and transports in Hampton Roads on the-^ 
following morning. The intervening night was consequently passed in great 
anxiety by the National commanders on land and Avater in that region. There 
seemed to be no competent human agency to avert the threatened disasters,^, 

• 1 Johnston, informed cf tlie strength of the Army of the Potomac, was satisfied that he could" 
not witlistand its advance, and had been preparing for the evacuation for several weeks, but with . 
such skill tliat McClellan was not aware of it. This was necessary, for his troops were so few 
that he could not form a respectable rear-guard to cover his retreat, with his supplies. Wooden 
guns took the place of some of iiis heavy ones at Manassas, when his ordnance was sent away. 
So well liad Johnston managed to deceive McClellan as to his force, that on the day when he 
evacuated Manassas, the chief of McClellan's secret service corps reported 98,000 Confede- 
rate soldiers "within twenty miles of Manassas," and a total of 115,000 in Virginia, with 300' 
tield-pieces. and twenty-six to thirty siege-guns '-before Washington." At the same time Gen- 
eral Wool, at Fortress Monroe, and General Wadsworth, back of Arlington Heights, gave th&,- 
government (what were subsequently proven to be truthful) statements, from reliable information,, 
that not over 50,000 troops were then in front of the Army of the Potomac. The actual number- 
seems to have been but 40,000. 

» By the President's order, dated March 11, 1862, General McClellan was relieved of the com- 
mand of other military departments. To General Halleck was given the command of the troops'- 
in the Valley of the Mississippi and westward of the longitude of Knoxville, m Tennessee; and ai 
Mountain Department, consisting of the region between Halleck and McClellan, was created, andii . 
placed in charge of General Fremont. The commanders of departments were ordered to reportt 
directly to the Secretary of War. 

^ This vessel presented the appearance on the water of a simple platform, sharp at each emit 
lying just above the surface, on which was a round revolving iron Martello tower, twenty feet in 
diameter and ten feet in height above the deck, and pierced for two guns. This turret, or tower, 
was made to revolve, so tlia't the guns could be brought to bear independent of the position of 
the hull of the vessel. The hull and turret were of heavy iron, and impervious to shot and 
BhelL This vessel was the invention of Captain John Ericsson, a scientific Swede, who had then 
been a President of this country full twenty years. Tlieodore 11. Timby invented the revolving 
turret, * Page 558. 



614 



THE NATION. 



[1862. 



when, at a little past midnight [March 9, 1862], a mysterious thing came in 
from the sea between the capes of Virginia, lighted on its way by the blazing 
Congress.'^ It was the Jlonitor on its ti'ial trip, commanded by Lieutenant 
John L. Worden.^ That gallant officer was soon made acquainted with the 
situation, and prepared to meet the devouring monster in the morning. Before 
sunrise, on that beautiful Sabbath day, it came sweeping down the Elizabeth 
Kiver. The Jlotiitor, like a little David, hastened to meet the Confederate 
Goliath. As it drew near, its invulnerable citadel began to move, and from 
it were hurled ponderous shot in quick succession. These were answered by 
broadsides from the Merrimack. The combat was temble. From the turret 




COMBAT BETWEEN THE MONITOR AND MEEKIMACK, 

and deck of the Monitor heavy round shot and conical bolts glanced off as 
pebbles would fly from contact with solid granite. The Merrimack was finally 
disabled by its mysterious antagonist, and fled up to Norfolk,^ The safe navi- 
gation of Hampton Roads, and, to some extent, that of the James River, was 
secured to the National vessels. The event produced joy in every loyal heart, 
and Ericsson, the inventor, and Worden, the commander, shared in the public 
gratitude.* 

Lnpressed Avith the belief that the navigation of the James River was now 



' The Cumberland was sunk aud the Congress was set on fire by the Merrimack. The maga- 
zine of the latter exploded, and destroyed what was left of her by the flames. Nearly one-half 
of the ofBcers and crews of both vessels were killed or wounded. Of the 434 men of the Congress, 
only one-half responded to their names the next morning at Newport-Newce. The dead were 
buried at that place, and their remains are among those of scores of Union soldiers. On a board, 
ill the form of a cross, at the head of one of the latter, whose name and history are unknown, 
might have been read in 1866 one of the most touching and poetical epitaphs ever inscribed. It 
read: "A Soluikb of the Union mustered out." 

"" Note 1, page 581. 

' Franklin Buchanan, a veteran officer of the National navy, who had abandoned his flag, wa3 
the commander of the Merrimack (which the Confederates named Virginia), and was so badlj 
wounded in the engagement that he was unfitted for service for some time. 

* "Worden was severely mjured during the engagement. In the turret of the Monitor was a 
small peep-hole, out of which the commander might see how to direct the turning of it, so as to bring 
liie guns properly to bear. While Worden was looking through this, a heavy shot struck squarely 
in front of the peep-hole, shivering some cement there and casting it violently into the face aud 



1862.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. QIQ 

free for the National gun-boats, McClellan, in accordance with the decision of 
a council of officers [March 13], proceeded to transfer the Army of the Potomac 
to Fortress Monroe, from which, as a base, it might march on Richmond, It 
was important for the security of Washington City, at the same time, to hold 
the Confederates in check in the Shenandoah Valley. Already the dashing 
General Lander, by a successful attack on " Stonewall Jackson '" at Blooming 
Gap [February 14, 1862], had made that leader circumspect. Now General 
N, P. Banks was in command in the Valley. When Johnston evacuated 
Manassas, Jackson, who had taken post at Winchester, moved farther up the 
Valley, followed by some of Banks's troops. The latter fell back, and a con- 
siderable force under General Shields took post at Winchester. Jackson 
returned, and at Kernstown, near Winchester, he and Shields had a severe 
engagement on the 22d of March,' at the close of which the defeated Confede- 
rates went in swift retreat up the Valley, followed far by Banks, who remained 
in that region to watch the foe, while McClellan should move on Richmond 
by way of the Virginia Peninsula. 

At the beginning of April McClellan was at Fortress Monroe, and began 
his march [April 5] up the Peninsula, with fifty thousand men, in two columns, 
led respectively by Generals Heintzelman^ and Keyes, one in the direction of 
Yorktown and the other toward Warwick Court House, nearer the James 
River. The Confederates, under Magruder,* about eleven thousand strong, 
were stretched across McClellan's path, from the York to the James, and by a 
skillful and deceptive display of strength in numbers, kept the Array of the 
Potomac before them (which speedily numbered one hundred thousand men) 
at bay for a month,* its leader calling earnestly for re-enforcements to enable 
him to move forward. He closely besieged his foes at Yorktown, and when 
the latter perceived that it was no longer prudent to remain, they fled up the 
Peninsula [May 3, 1862] and made a stand behind a strong line of works in 
front of Williamsburg, The bulk of the National army pursued, under the 
directions of General Sumner, while McClellan remained at Yorktown, to 
fiuperintend the forwarding of an expedition up the York River, under General 
Franklin, to flank the Confederates. 

eyes of the commander. The shock was so great that the persons in the turret were prostrated. 
Only Worden was seriously hurt. For several days afterward his life was in great peril. He 
recovered, and did gallant service afterward on the Southern coast. 

' Thomas J. Jackson, who became one of the most renowned of the Confederate leaders, was 
in command of a brigade at the battle of Bull's Run, where his men gallantly withstood all 
assaults. "See I" exclaimed another leader (General Bee), when trying to rally panic-stricken 
troops, "there stands Jackson like a stone wall!" The latter was ever afterward called "Stone- 
wall Jackson," and his troops the "Stonewall Brigade." 

" Shields reported his loss at nearly 600 men, of whom 103 were killed. Jackson's loss was 
over 1,000. It was estimated at 1,500 by Shields. 

* In Heintzelman's column were the divisions of Fitz-John Porter, Hamilton, and Sedgwick; 
«nd with Keyes were the divisions of Generals Couch and W. F. Smith. 

* Page 562. 

' The tedious operations of a regular siege, by casting up intrenchments, were under the 
■direction of General Porter. Frequent skirmishes occurred during the siege, but only one tliat 
had the semblance of a battle. That was on the 16th of April, when General Smith attacked the 
€onfederates on the "Warwick River, between the mills of Lee and Winn, He was repulsed, with 
the loss of one hundred men on liis part and of seventy-five on the part of liis foe. McClel* 
^n's army suffered much from sickness during the month's detention in that swampy region. 



616 



THE NATION. 



[1862. 




The works in front of Williamsburg were strong, extending across that 
narrowest part of the Peninsula from estuaries of the York and James Rivers. 
There the Confederate leader left a strong rear-guard to check the pursuers, 
while the main body (a greater portion of which had not been below Williams- 
burg), then under the command of General Joseph E. Johnston, who had come 

down from Richmond, should retreat up 
the Peninsula. Johnston's intention was 
to concentrate all his troops near Rich- 
mond, and then give battle. The pur- 
suing force, after their advance under 
General Stoneman had been checked in 
front of the Confederate works, pushed 
boldly up to attack them under such 
leaders as Hooker, Kearney, and Han- 
cock, who were conspicuous on that occa- 
sion. Hooker began the assault early on 
the morning of the 6th [May, 1862], and 
bore the brunt of battle almost nine 
consecutive hours, when Kearney came 
to his assistance, and Hancock turned the 
left of the Confederates. The latter, overpowered, retreated, and such was 
their haste, that they left nearly eight hundred of their wounded behind.' 
McClellan came upon the battle-field toward the close of the engagement, and 
the next morning he sent tidings of the victory to the government from the 
ancient capital of Virginia. Johnston was then pressing on toward the Chick- 
ahominy, with fearful anticipation of disaster if again struck in his retreat by 
the Nationals ; but the pursuit there ended, and McClellan's army, during the 
succeeding ten or fifteen days, made its way leisurely to the Chickahominy, 
behind which Johnston was then safely encamped." In the mean time Frank- 
lin's expedition, too long held at Yorktown by the Commander-in-Chief to win 
the advantages of a flank movement, had secured a strong footing near the 
head of the York River, and there, on the bank of the Pamunkey River, Gene- 
ral McClellan established his base of supplies for the Army of the Potomac. 

On the 20th of May [1862], McClellan's army was on the borders of the 
Chickahominy River, and a portion of it, under General Casey, occupied the 
heights on the Richmond side of the stream, on the New Kent road. In the 
mean time important events had occurred in the rear of the Army of the Poto- 



JOSEPH E. JOHNSTON. 



' So vigorous was the assault of Hooker, that Johnston sent back a greater part of his force 
to the assistance of his rear-guard. The final retreat was made under the lead of General Long- 
street, one of the best of the Confederate generals. 

" On the evening after the battle, McClellan telegraphed to the Secretary of "War that the Con- 
federates were before him in force probably greater than his own, and strongly intrenched, and 
assured the Secretary tliat lie should "run the risk of holding them in checlt there." At 
that time Johnston's 30,000 men were fleeing as rapidly as possible toward the Cliiekaliominy 
before McClellan's victorious 100,000 men. P^xperts on both sides declared tliat had the pursuit 
been continued, in the morning after the battle at Williamsburg, the National army might haTe 
crushed that of the Confederates, or followed them directly into Richmond. 



1862.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



6ir 



mac. General Wool/ in command at Fortress Monroe, had long desired to 
attempt the capture of Norfolk. Permission was at length given him by the 
President and Secretary of War.' With a few regiments he landed [May 10, 
1862] in the rear of the Confederate works below Norfolk, and marched tri- 
xmiphantly toward the city. The Confederate forces there, under General 
Huger, destroyed the Merrimack^ and fled toward Petersburg and Richmond. 
Norfolk was surrendered to Wool by the civil authorities. The Confederate 
vessels of war in the James River fled up toward Riclmiond, and were followed 
by National gun-boats, under Commodore Rogers, to Drewry's Blufi^, eio-ht 
miles below the capital of the Confederates, where they were checked [May 
15] by a strong fort. 

Important events had also been occurring in the Shenandoah Valley and 
the adjacent region. At about the time of the siege of Yorktown, General 
Fremont was at Franklin, among the mountains of Western Virginia. Gene- 
ral Banks was at Strasburg, in the Shenandoah Valley, and General McDowell 
was at Fredericksburg, on the Rappahannock, for the double purpose of cover- 
ing Washington and co-operating with McClellan. Jackson had been joined 
by the skillful Ewell, in the vicinity of Harrisonburg. Other troops were near, 
and he was watching Banks closely. At McDowell [May 8], west of Staunton, 
he struck one of Fremont's brigades, under General Milroy, a severe blow, 
while Ewell pressed Banks back to Strasburg. Jackson and Ewell soon after- 
ward captured and dispersed [May 23] a National force under Colonel Kenly^ 
at Front Royal, and sent Banks flying down the Shenandoah Valley from 
Strasburg, hotly pursued to Winchester. There Ewell attacked him [May 25]» 
and after a severe contest he continued his 
flight to the banks of the Potomac, near Wil- 
liamsport. The National capital was now in 
peril, and McDowell was ordered to send a 
lai-ge force over the Blue Ridge, to intercept 
the Confederates, if they should retreat, Avhile 
Fremont should march on Strasburg from the 
west, for the same purpose. Jackson perceived 
his peril, and his whole force fled up the valley 
in time to elude the troops on their flank. 
Fremont pursued them up the main valley, and 
Shields, with a considerable force, marched 
rapidly up the parallel Luray Valley. At a 
place called Cross Keys, near Harrisonburg, 
Fremont overtook Ewell, when a severe but 

undecisive battle ensued [June V]. Jackson was then at Port Republic, a few 
miles distant, sorely pressed by Generals Carroll and Tyler. He called Eweh 
to his aid. The latter moved off" in the niq;ht. Fremont followed ; but Ewell 




T. J. JACKSON. 



' Page 413, and note 5, page 570. 

" Wool's command was not under the direction of McClellan. It remained an independent 
one so long as that veteran was at the head of that department. 
' Page 614. 



^l^ THE NATION [1862. 

managed to cross the Shenandoah and burn the bridge behind him before Fre- 
mont could reach that stream. Meanwhile Jackson's assailants had been 
repulsed, and on the 9th of June the whole National army on the Shenandoah 
retraced their steps. So ended the second great race of the National and Con- 
federate troops in the Shenandoah Valley. 

When Rogers went up to Drewry's Bluff,' the James and York Rivers 
were both opened as highways for supplies for the Army of the Potomac, 
McClellan determined to continue his base at the head of York, until he 
should form a junction with McDowell. That event was postponed by others 
in the Shenandoah Valley, just recorded, and the two great armies stood face 
to face near Richmond toward the close of May, with little expectation of aid 
from their respective comrades in that Valley, Their first collision was on 
the 23d, near Mechanicsville, when the Confederates were driven, and the army 
and loyal people were thrilled by a general order issued by McClellan the next 
day, which indicated an immediate advance upon Richmond. Every thing 
was in readiness for the movement, and the Confederates were trembling in 
anticipation of it,' McClellan hesitated, and the golden moments of opportu- 
nity were spent in flank movements, which resulted in severe struggles, that 
were fruitless of good to the National army,^ 

The skillful and vigilant Johnston, soon perceiving the perilous position of 
the National forces, divided by the fickle Chickahominy,^ and the timidity of 
their chief, marched boldly out from his strong intrenchments before Rich- 
mond to attack them. On the afternoon of the 31st [May, 1862], a heavy 
force of the Confederates fell furiously upon the most advanced National 
troops, under General Casey, and a sanguinary battle ensued. Casey fought 
liis foe most gallantly, until one-third of his division was disabled, and he was 

1 Page 617. 

' The appearance of Rogers's flotilla before Drewry's Bluff simultaneously -with McClellan's 
advance toward the Chickahominy produced the greatest consternation in Richmond, especially 
among the Secessionists. Davis, their chief, almost despaired, and the general expectation 
■ that the National forces would speedily march into Richmond, caused the chief leaders to make 
preparations for flight. The "archives of the government," so called, were sent to Columbia, 
South Carolina, and to Lynchburg. The railway tracks over the bridges at Richmond were 
•covered with planks, so as to facilitate the passage of artillery, and every man who was active in 
the rebellion trembled with fear. The Legislature of Virginia, then in session, disgusted with 
the cowardice and perfidy of Davis and his chief associates in crime, passed resolutions calling 
upon them to act witli manliness and honor, and to stay and protect at all hazards the people they 
had betrayed. .This action, it is believed, was inspired by the manly Johnston, then at the head 
of the army, whose virtues were a standing rebuke to the cold selfishness of the chief con- 
spirator. 

^ The troops engaged were regular cavalry under General Emory ; Benson's horse-battery ; 
Morrell's division, composed of ihe brigades of Martindale, Butterfield, and McQuade, and Ber- 
dan's sharp-shooters; three batteries under Captain Griffin, and a "provisional brigade," under 
■Colonel G. K. Warren, in support. Their first encounter was near Hanover Court House [May 
27], when a charge by Butterfield's brigade dispersed the Confederates. At the same time Gen- 
■eral Martindale was contending with fresh troops that came up from Richmond, and attacked him 
while moving between Peake's Station and Hanover Court House. Porter sent assistance to 
Martindale, when the Confederates, outnumbered, fell back, with a loss of 200 men dead on the 
Held, and 700 made prisoners. The National loss was 350. 

. ■* The Chickahominy River is a narrow stream, and liable to a sudden and great increase of 
volume and overflow of its banks by rains. For this reason it might, in a few hours, become an 
impassable barrier between bodies of troops where bridges did not exist. In this instance the 
Confederates had destroyed the bridges. 



1862.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. gl9 

driven back by an overwhelming force. Troops sent to his aid by Keyes 
could not withstand the pressure, and all were driven back to Fair Oaks Sta- 
tion, on the Richmond and York River Railway, w^here the struggle continued. 
Heintzelnian and Kearney pressed forward with re-enforceraents, but fresh 
Confederates were there to meet them, and it seemed at one time as if the 
whole of the National forces on the Richmond side of the Chickahominy were 
doomed to destruction. At that critical moment the veteran General Sumner 
appeared, with the divisions of Sedgwick and Richardson, and checked the 
Confederate advance by a storm of canister-shot from twenty-four guns. But 
they soon pressed forward again and fought gallantly, notwithstanding John- 
ston, their chief, who was directing the battle, was severely wounded and 
borne away. Finally, at eight o'clock in the evening, a bayonet charge by 
five regiments broke the Confederate line into dire confusion. The contest 
was renewed in the morning [June l], and after a struggle for several hours, 
in which Hooker's command also was engaged, the Confederates withdrew, 
and retired to Richmond that night. So ended the battle of Fair Oaks, or 
Seven Pines. 

For nearly a month after this the Army of the Potomac lay along the 
Chickahominy, a few miles from Richmond, in a very unhealthful situation, 
quietly besieging the Confederate capital. Robert E. Lee' succeeded John- 
ston, and he was joined by Jackson and Ewell, with a force so considerable 
that he prepared to strike McClellan a deadly blow. Fifteen hundred of his 
cavalry, under J. E. B. Stewart," made a complete circuit of the Army of the 
Potomac at the middle of June, threatening its supplies at the White House,' 
near the head of York River, and gaining valuable information. Meantime 
the public expectation was kept on the alert by frequent assurances that the 
decisive battle would be fought " to-morrow." For that purpose re-enforce- 
ments were called for, and sent ; yet the cautious commander hesitated until 
Lee made a movement which compelled him to take a defensive position, and 
prepare to abandon the siege and retreat to the James River. That movement 
was made on the 26th of June. Jackson, with a considerable force, marched 
from Hanover Court House to turn McClellan's right, and fall upon his com- 
munications with his supplies at the White House ; and at the same time a 
heavier force, under Generals Longstreet and D. H. and A. P. Hill, crossed the 
Chickahominy near Mechanicsville, and assailed the National right wing, com- 
manded by General Fitz John Pox'ter. A terrific battle ensued near Ellison's 

' Page 564. ' Page 585. 

^ The White House was the name of an estate on the Pamimkey River, that belonged to the 
Custis family by inheritance from Mrs. Washington, whose first husband owned it. Her great- 
grand-daughter was the wife of Robert E. Lee, and this property was in the possession of the 
latter's eldest son when the Civil War broke out. The name was derived from the color of the 
mansion on the estate at the time Washington was married to Mrs. Custis. It was white, and 
thus distinguished from others. That mansion was demolished more than thirty years before 
the war, and near its site was another, of modest form and dimensions, which was called the 
" White House." This was held sacred, for some time, by the Union troops, in consequence 
of a false impression given by the family that it was the 'original "White House." When 
McClellan changed his base to the James River, and his stores were fired, the modern 
■"White House" was consumed. 



(320 THE NATION. [1862. 

Mill, which resulted in the defeat of the Confederates, who suffered a fearful 



Notwithstanding this victory, McClellan decided that the time had come 
for him to fly toward the James River, if he would save his army. He was 

left to choose between 
a concentration of his 
whole force on the left 
bank of the Chick- 
ahominy, and give 
general battle to Lee's 
army ; to concentrate 
it on the right bank, 
and march directly on 
Richmond, or to trans- 
fer his right wing to 
that side of the stream, 
and with his supplies 
retreat to the James 
River. He chose the 
latter course, and made 
preparations accord- 
ingly.* He ordered 
the stores at the White 
House to be destroyed if they could not be removed, and held Porter's 
corps in a strong position near Gaines's Mills, a short distance from 
Ellison's Mill, to give protection as far as possible to the supplies, and 
to the remainder of the troops in the removal of the siege-guns, their pas- 
sage of the river, and their march toward the James. There, between Cool 
Arbor^ and the Chickahominy, in line of battle on the arc of a circle. Porter 
stood when attacked by the Hills and Longstreet,* on the afternoon of the 
^Ith of June. Very severe Avas the battle that ensued. Porter, hard pressed, 
sent to McClellan, then on the opposite side of the Chickahominy, for aid, but 
the commander, believing Magruder's 25,000 men at Richmond to be 60,000 
in number, could spare only Slocum's division of Franklin's corps. Later, the 
brigades of Richardson and Meagher were sent, and these arrived just in time 
to save Porter from annihilation, for his shattered and disheartened army was 




VIEW ON THE CHICKAHOMINY NEAR MECHANICSVILLE. 



' It was between 3,000 and 4,000 men. The National loss was about 400. The latter were 
well posted on an eminence ; the former were much exposed in approaching over lower and open 
ground. . *. 

■■' According to ofiBcial and other statements by the Confederates, Richmond was at that time 
entirely at tlie mercy of the Army of the Potomac, it being defended by only 25,000 men under 
Magruder, who in his report declared that if McClellan had massed his force and moved on Rich- 
mond while Lee was beyond the Chickahominy, he might easily have captured it. "His failure 
to do so," said Magruder in his report, "'is the best evidence that our wise commander fully 
understood the cliaracter of his opponent." 

^ The place of an ancient tavern and summer resort for the inhabitants of Richmond two 
generations before. 

* Page 619. 



1862.] LIXCOLN*S A D MI XIST R ATIO N. gO^ 

falling back to the river in disorder, closely pressed by the foe. The appear- 
ance and cheers of the fresh troops encouraged the fugitives, who re-formed, 
checked the alarmed pursuers, and drove them back to the field they had won. 
So ended the battle of Gaines's Mills.' During that night Porter's corps with- 
drew to the right bank of the Chickahominy, destroying the bridges behind 
them. 

McClellan now turned his back upon Richmond, with his face toward the 
James, and gave orders for his army to move through the White Oak S^'amp 
in the direction of Turkey Bend, on that river. Keyes led the way [June 28]. 
Porter followed ; and after these moved a train of 5,000 wagons, laden with 
ammunition, provisions, and baggage, and a drove of 2,500 beef cattle.^ So 
well was this movement masked from Lee, that he had no suspicion of it until 
more than twenty-four hours after it began.^ He had observed, in the mornino-, 
some singular movements of the divisions which remained behind, and some 
skirmishes had taken place, but he supposed McClellan might be preparing to 
move his forces and give battle in defense of his stores at the White House, 
or, if he retreated, would take the route on the left bank of the Chickahominy, 
by which Johnston came up from Williamsburg.* But on the night of the 28th 
the amazing fact was disclosed to Lee that a greater pqrtion of the Army of 
the Potomac had departed, not to give battle on the north side of the Chicka- 
hominy, nor to retreat down the Peninsula, but to take a new position on the 
James River. Scouts had already informed him that a large portion of the 
supplies at the White House had been removed, and that the remainder, and 
the mansion itself, were then in flames, 

McClellan had full twenty-four hours the start of Lee, yet he found himself 
compelled to struggle for life in that retreat. His rear-guard, under Sumner, 
Avas struck at Savage's Station, where a severe battle was fought [June 29]. It 
continued until late in the evening, when the Confederates recoiled; and 
before morning [July l], the whole of McClellan's army was well on its way 
toward the James. Franklin, with a rear-guard, had been left to hold the 
main bridge over White Oak Swamp Creek, and so to cover the withdrawal 
of the army to the high open country of the Malvern Hills ; and at that point 
and at Glendale,' a short distance to the right, severe engagements ensued. 
The battle at the latter place was very sanguinary, in which the Pennsyl- 
vanians under McCall suffered much. That leader was captured, and General 
Meade was severely wounded. By the timely arrival of fresh troops under 

' The National loss was about 8,000 men, of whom about 6,000 were killed and wounded. 
The Confederate loss was about 5,000. Porter lost twenty-two siege-guns. 

^ The sick and wounded men, who could not march, were left behind, with surgeons, rations, 
and medical stores. These fell into the hands of the Confederates, and the men suffered terribly. 
The reason given for this abandonmeut of the helpless, and the sending away of the ambulances 
empty, was, that so large a number (about 2,500) of wounded and sick men would embarrass 
the army in its flight, and its escape might be impossible. 

^ All day long Magruder and Huger had reported to Lee that the National fortifications on their 
front were as fully manned as usual, and Lee supposed his foe was preparing for an offensive 
movement. 

* Page 616. 

' The name of an estate. The battle occurred on the property of several owners. Tt is some- 
times called the Battle of Frazier's Farm. 



622 



THE NATION. 



[1862. 



Hooker, Meagher, and Taylor, victory was given to the Nationals ; and early 
the next day the Army of the Potomac, united for the first time since the 
Chickahominy first divided it,' was in a strong position on Malvern Hills,^ in 
sight of the James River. It was not considered a safe place for the army to 
halt, for it was too far separated from its supplies ; so, on the morning of the 
1st [July, 1862], McClellan went on board the gun-boat Galena^ and pro- 
ceeded down the river to " select the final location for the army and its depots," 
This was fixed at Harrison's Bar, a short distance from Malvern Hills. 

Preparations were made on Malvern Hills for a battle. Lee concentrated 
his troops at Glendale for that purpose on the morning of the 1st [July, 1862], 
and resolved, with a heavy line under Jackson, Ewell, Whiting, the Hills, 
Longstreet, Magruder, and Huger, to carry the intrenched camp of the Nationals 
by storm, and " drive the invaders," he said, " into the James." This was 
attempted. A furious battle ensued, in which Porter, Couch, and Kearney 
were the chief leaders of fighting troops on the part of the Nationals, and these 
were assisted by gun-boats in the river. The struggle was intense and destruc- 
tive, and did not cease until almost nine o'clock in the evening, when the Con- 
federates were driven to the shelter of the ravines and swamps, utterly broken 
and despairing. The victory for the Nationals was decisive, and the Union 
leaders expected to 'follow it up, pursue Lee's shattered columns, and enter 
Richmond within twenty-four hours, when they were overwhelmed with 
disappointment by an order from the Commander-in-Chief (who had been 
on the Galena most of the day) for the victorious army to "fall back 

=el ,= still farther " to Harrison's Landing.* 

This seemed like snatching the palm of 
victory from the hand just opened to 
receive it, but it was obeyed, and on the 
evening of the 3d of July the Army of 
the Potomac, broken and disheartened, 
was resting on the James River, and on 
the 8th what was left of Lee's Army of 
Northern Virginia was behind the de- 
fenses of Richmond.* 

Very grievous was the disappoint- 
ment of the loyal people when they heard 
of this disastrous result of the campaign 
against Richmond, and most astounding to the government was the assurance of 




THE HARRISON MANSION. 



' Page 616. 

" These form a high rolling plateau, sloping toward Richmond from bold banks toward the 
river, and bounded by deep ravines, making an excellent defensive position. 

' McClellan's order produced consternation and great dissatisfaction among the officers and men. 
The veteran General Kearney was very indignant, and in the presence of several officers said : 
"I, Philip Kearney, an old soldier, enter my solemn protest against this order for a retreat. "VVe 
ought, instead of retreating, to follow up the enemy and take Richmond ; and, in full view of all 
the responsibilities of such a declaration, I say to you all, such an order can only be prompted by 
cowardice or treason." 

* The aggregate loss of the National army during the seven days' contest before Richmond, or 
from the battle near Mechanicsville [M»y 23] until the posting of the army at Harrison's Bar, was 



1862.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. g23 

the commander of the Army of the Potomac, three days after the battle on 
Malvern Hills, that he had not " over 50,000 men left, with their colors !" 
Within the space of a hundred days 160,000 men had gone to the Peninsula. 
What had become of the vast remainder ? The anxious President hastened to 
the head-quarters of McClellan for an answer to that question, for the latter 
was now calling for more troops, to enable him to " capture Richmond and put 
an end to the Rebellion." Jhe President found nearly 40,000 more men there 
than the general had reported, and yet 75,000 were missing. He could get no 
satisfactory statement from McClellan,' and he found that several of the corps 
commanders had lost confidence in the chief. In view of this fact, the con- 
centration of Confederate troops in the direction of Washington, and the 
assurance of McClellan that his army was not strong enough to capture Rich- 
mond by " one hundred thousand men, more rather than less," it was thought 
advisable by the President to withdraw that army from the Peninsula and 
concentrate it in front of the National capital. Orders were given accord- 
ingly. McClellan was opposed to the measure, and at once took steps to 
defeat it. 

Here we will leave the Army of the Potomac for a little while, and observe 
events nearer the National capital, with which its movements were intimately 
connected. To give more efficiency to the troops covering Washington, they 
were formed into an organization called the Army of Virginia, and placed 
under the command of Major-General John Pope, who was called from the 
West' for that purpose. The new army was arranged in three corps, com- 
manded respectively by Major-Generals McDowell, Banks, and Sigel.^ In 
addition to these, a force under General S. D. Sturgis was in process of forma- 
tion at Alexandria ; and the troops in and around Washington were placed 
under Pope's command. He also had about five thousand cavalry. His army 
for field-service, at the close of June, numbered between forty and fifty 
thousand effective men. He wrote to McClellan, cordially offering his co-opera- 
tion Avith him, and asking for suggestions. The cold and vague answer 
assured Pope that he need not expect any useful co-working with the com- 
mander of the Array of the Potomac. 

Immediately after the retreat of McClellan to Harrison's Landing,^ the Con- 
federates formed plans for the capture of Washington City ; and when, at the 
close of July, Halleck^ ordered the Army of the Potomac to prepare to move 

reported by McClellan at 1,582 killed, 7,709 wounded, and 5,598 missing, making a total of 15,249. 
Lee's loss was never reported. He declared that he captured 10,000 prisoners, and took 52 pieces 
of cannon and 35,000 small arras. 

' After his return to Washington, the President wrote to McClellan [July 13], asking him for 
an account of the missing numbers, lie reported 88,665 "present and fit for duty;" absent by 
authority, 34,472; absent without authority, 3,778; sick, 16,605, making a total of 143,580. Tlio 
government was much disturbed by one item in this report, namely, that over 34,000 men, or 
more than three-fifths of the entire number of the army which he had reported on the 3d, were 
absent on furloughs granted by permission of the commanding general, when he was continually 
calling for re-enforcements and holding the government responsible for the weakness of his army. 
The President said to him: "If you had these men with you, you could go into Richmond in tlia 
next three days." 

" Page 600. ' Page 572. * Page 622. 

• Halleck was now acting General-in-Chief See page 604. 



^24 "^^^^ NATION. [1862. 

to the front of tlie National capital, and join Fope in its defense, Lee moved 
with energy to execute the orders of his masters, before the junction of the 
two Union armies could be eftected. Satisfied that no further movements 
against Richmond were then conteinplated, he was left free to act in full force. 
In the plan of the Confederates was the expulsion of the National troops from 
the soil of Slave-labor States, the invasion and plunder of Ohio and Pennsyl- 
vania, and the dictation of terms of peace at Cincinnati and Philadelphia ; and 
the people of the " Confederate States " were made to expect a speedy vision 
of Davis in the chair of Dictatorship at AYashington City. These dreams 
were almost realized before the heats of summer had departed. 

Pope moved vigorously toward the advancing Confederates, in the direc= 
tion of Richmond, at the middle of July, and some of his cavalry destroyed 
railway-tracks and bridges within thirty-five miles of the Confederate capital 
Meanwhile a heavy force under " Stonewall " Jackson had gathered at Gor- 
<lonsville, and Pope's main army Avas near Culpepper Court-House, between 
the Rappahannock and Rapid Anna' Rivers. They each advanced in force, 
and at the foot of Cedar, or Slaughter Mountain, a few miles west of Culj^ep- 
per Court-House, they had a severe battle on the 9th of August. The Nation- 
als were under the general command of Banks, ably assisted by Generals 
Crawford, Geary, Auger, and others. They were finally pressed back by 
overwhelming numbers and pursued, when the Confederates were checked by 
the timely arrival of Ricketts' division of McDowell's corps. The strife had 
been one of the most desperate of the war, a part of it hand to hand in the 
darkness, and under a pall of smoke that obscured the moon.* Two days 
afterward Jackson retreated precipitately to Gordonsville, leaving some of his 
dead unburied. He was chased, bixt a sudden rise of the Rapid Anna placed a 
barrier between the pursuers and the pursued. Both parties claimed the palm 
of victory in the battle of Cedar Mountain. 

Soon after this conflict Pope and Jackson were both re-enforced. The 
former was joined by troops under Burnside, from North Carolina,^ and others 
under Stevens, from the coast of South Carolina ; and the latter was strength- 
ened by divisions under Longstreet, some troops under Hood, and Stuart's 
cavalry. Pope moved to the Rapid Anna, with the intention of holding that 
position until the arrival of the Army of the Potomac in his rear ; but before 
that event occurred, he was compelled to fall back by the advance of Lee in 
crushing force. He retired behind the forks of the Rappahannock, closely pur- 

' The name of this river has generally been spelled Rapidan. It is one of three rivers in that 
portion of Virginia bearing the name of Anna — namely, tlie Rapid Anna, North Anna, and South 
Anna. The first is the chief tributary of the Rappahannock, and the two latter form the Pamim- 
key River. 

. * General Crawford's brigade came out of that terrible fight a mere remnant. Some regiments 
lost half their number. General Geary, with Pennsylvania and Ohio troops, made desperate 
charges, and was severely wounded. General Auger was also wounded, and General Price was 
made prisoner. The National loss was about two thousand in killed and wounded, and that of 
the Confederates about the same. 

^ Page 590. These had first gone to the Peninsula to aid McCleUan. and were the first of the 
troops there who promptly obeyed the summons of the Army of the Potomac to the defense of 
Washington Cit\-. 



32.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



62 5 



«ued by Lee's cavalry, and along the line of that river, above Fredericksburg, 
there was an artillery duel for two days [August 20 and 21, 1862]. Lee found 
that he could not force a j^assage of that stream, so he moved toward the 
mountains, for the jKiriJose of flanking the Nationals. Pope made skillful and 
energetic efforts to thwart the design of his enemy, but the danger became 
greater every hour. Pope's force had l)een greatly weakened by fighting and 
marching, and the Army of the Potomac Avas coming to his relief so tardily, 
that he almost despaired of its arrival in time to be useful.' 

The National capital was now, late in August, in great peril. Pope, 
encouraged by the belief that McClellan's fresh troops, which had been resting 
for a month, would almost immediately re-enforce him, massed his army near 
Rappahannock Station [Aug. 23, 1 862], for the purpose of fiilling upon a heavy 
flanking force. Movements to this end were made. Franklin, of the Army of 
the Potomac, had lately arrived with troops, and Ileintzelman and Porter, of 
the same army, were also near, so that, on the 25th, Pope's army, and its re-en- 
forcements at hand, with their backs on Washington and their faces to the foe, 
wei-e about sixty thousand strong, but still somewhat scattered. On that day 
" Stonewall Jackson," leading the great flank movement, crossed the Rappa- 
hannock, and with his ac- 
customed celerity made '^^ -^ 
his way over the Bull's ^ 
Run Mountains at Tho- 
roughfare Gap. At twi- 
light on the 26th he was 
on the railway in Pope's 
rear, and between his 
army and Washington 
City. The Confederate 
cavalry swept over the 
country in the direction 
of Washington, as far as 
Fairfax Court-House and 
Centreville, and Jackson, 

taking possession in strong force of Manassas Junction, 
an approaching heavy column under Longstreet. 

Both armies were now in a critical situation. Pope took vigorous measures 




^m\ 



-'^w^m*^>^^i' 



THOROUtiHFAKE GAP. 



ited the arrival of 



^ At the dose of Jalj, Halleck ordered preparations for the removal of tlie Army of the Poto- 
mac from the Peninsula, and on the od of August he issued a positive order for it to move at once. 
McClellan protested. He told his government that the force under Pope was " not necessary to 
maintain a strict defensive in front of Washington and Harper's Ferry:" instructed his 
superiors that the " true defense of Washington was on the banks of the .James, where the fate 
of the Union was to be decided;" and then awaited further orders. Halleck repeated his com- 
mand, and urged McClehan to use all possible diligence in effecting the departure of his troops. 
After the battle of Cedar Mountain he told him there •■ must be no further delay " in his move- 
ments, for Washington was m danger. It was twenty days after McClellan received orders to 
transfer his army to Aquia Creek, oa the Potomac, before they were executed, and that army 
failed to give Pope timely and sufficient aid. 

" Pages 5G7 and 572. 

40 



626 



THE NATION. 



[862. 



for capturing Jackson, or at the least preventing the junction of his and Long- 
street's forces. His plans, experts say, were well chosen, and, had they been 
as well executed by all of his subordinates, success must have crowned his 
efforts. But they were not, and disaster was the consequence. Longstreet, 
with the van of Lee's army, joined Jackson [August 29] near Groveton, not 
far from the Bull's Run battle-ground, and there the combined forces fought 
the whole of Pope's army, excepting Banks's command, then at Bristow's Sta- 
tion. The battle was very severe, but not decisive. The loss was about seven 




MONUMENT AND BATTLE-GROUND NEAR GROVETON.' 

thousand on each side. Prudence counseled a retreat for Pope, but, still 
expecting immediate re-enforcements, he prepared for a renewal of the strug- 
gle in the morning. When morning came he was assured of no further aid 
from McClellan,' and he had then no alternative. He must fight. He prepared 
for battle. A movement of the enemy deceived him, and supposing Lee to be 
retreating, he ordered a pursuit. On a portion of the Bull's Run battle-groimd, 
near Groveton, his advance was assailed [August 30] by a heavy force in 
ambush. A sanguinary conflict ensued, in which the Nationals were defeated 
and driven across Bull's Run by way of the Stone Bridge.^ At Centreville 
they were joined by the corps of Franklin and Sumner. Lee was not disposed 
to attack them there, so he sent Jackson [August 31], with his own and Ewell's 
divisions, to make another flank movement. This brought on another battle on 



' After the war, Union soldiers, stationed near this battle-ground, erected a monument of the 
sand-stone of the vicinity, on the field of strife, to tlie memory of their comrades. The above 
picture shows the monument and the battle-field, looking toward Manassas Junction. 

* Pope had received no re-enforcements or supplies since the 2Gth. He confidently expected 
rations and forage from McClellan, who was at Alexandria, and had been ordered to supply them, 
but on the morning of the 30th, when it was too late to retreat and perilous to stand still, Pope 
received information that supplies would be "loaded into available wagons and cars," so soon as 
he should send a cavalry escort for the train ! — a thing utterly impossible. Meanwhile the corps 
of Sumner and Franklin, of McClellan's command, which might on that day have secured victory 
for the Nationals, were not permitted to go within supporting distance of the struggling armj 
until the next dav, when Pope, for want of support, had lost every advantage. 
» Page 569. 



1862] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



627 



the 1st of September, at Chantilly, not far from Fairfax Court-Hoiise, in which 
Generals Kearney and Stevens were shot dead, and many gallant oflScers and mea 
were mortally wounded.' The Nationals 
held the field that night, and on the fol- 
lowing day [Sept. 2] fell back within the 
fortifications around Washington City.^ 
Thus ended Pope's campaign in Virginia, 
and also his military career in the East. 
He had labored hard under many difficul- 
ties, and he bitterly complained of a lack 
of co-operation with him, in his later 
struggles, by McClellan and some of his 
subordinates.^ 

The Repiiblic now seemed to be in 
great danger, and the loyal people were 
very anxious. Already the President, 
by a call on the 1st of June, had drawn 
forty thousand men for three months 
from New England, Already the loyal 
governors of eighteen States, acting under the conviction of a large portion of 
their constituents, who were evidently losing confidence in the leader of the 
Army of the Potomac, had requested the President to call for three hundred 
thousand rolunteers "for the war,"'' and he had complied [July l] ; and when 
Pope was struggling with Jackson near the Rapid Anna, he called [August 
9th] for three hundred thousand men for nine months, with the understanding 
that an equal number of men would be drafted from the great body of the 
citizens who were over eighteen and less than forty-five years of age, if they 
did not appear as volunteers. These calls met with hearty responses, for the 
loyal people had determined to save the Republic. Thousands of volunteers 
were now flocking . to the standard of their country. The Confederates were 
alarmed, and Lee was instructed to take advantage of the reverses to the 
National arms, and act boldly, vigorously, and even desperately, if necessary, 
in an attempt to capture Washington City. He was re-enfoi'ced by the divi- 




PHILrP KEARNEY. 



' The National loss in Pope's campaign in Virginia, from the battle of Cedar Mountain to that 
of Chantilly, was never officially reported in full. Careful estimates make it (including aa 
immense number of stragglers who were returned to their regiments) 30,000. Lee's loss was 
probably about 15,000. 

'' See map on page 572. 

^ During the last few days in which the Army of Virginia was struggling for life, the authori- 
ties at Washington, by commands and assistance, made every effort to induce McCleUan to aid 
Pope, but in vain. And when, on the 29th of August, Halleck telegraphed to McClellan, saying, 
" I want Frankhn's corps to go far enough to find out something about the enemj^," the latter 
telegraphed to the President, saying: — "I am clear that one of two courses should be adopted: 
First, to concentrate all our available forces to open communication with Pope. Second, to leave 
Pope to get out of his scrape, and at once use all our means to make the capital safe." 

* Clamors began to arise on every side. Men of influence, whose faith in the " young Napo- 
leon," as McCleilan was fondly called, had been unbounded, now shook their heads doubtingly. 
They clearly perceived that if 150,000 to 200,000 men could not make more headway in the work 
of crushing the rebellion than they had done under his leadership, during full ten months, more 
men must be called to the field at once, and put under a more efficient leader, or all would be lo»t 



6i8 



THE NATION. 



[1862. 



sion of D. II. Hill, and then, operating upon the original plan of General John 
ston, of pushing into Maryland and getting in the rear of Washington,' he 
crossed the Potomac with almost his entire force by the 7th of September, with 
the belief that thousands of the citizens of Maryland would join his standard.- 
The Army of Virginia had now disappeared as a separate organization, and, 
became a pai't of the Army of the Potomac, with McClellan still at its head. 
AYhen the latter was informed of Lee's movement into Maryland, he left Gene- 
ral Banks in command in Washington City, and with a greater part of his 
army, nearly 90,000 in number, he went in pursuit. He moved very cautiously, 
but was soon advised that Lee's plan was to take possession of Harper's Ferry, 
and open communication with Richmond by way of the Shenandoah Valley: 
and meanwhile to draw McClellan far toward the Susquehanna, and, turning 
suddenly u{)on him, defeat him and march upon Washington.' McClellan fol- 
lowed him through Frederick and over South Mountain into the Antietam 
Valley. At Turner's Gap, on the South Mountain, a portion of the National 
army, led by Burnside, had a severe tight [September 14] with a part of Lee's, 
and at the same time another portion, under Franklin, was striving to force its 

way over the same 
range of hills at Cramp- 
ton's Gap, nearer Har- 
per's Ferry. In the 
battle on South Moun- 
tain, the gallant Gene- 
ral Reno was killed.^ 
The strife ceased at 
evening, and the Na- 
tionals were prepared 
to renew it in the morn- 
ing. During the night 
the Confederates with- 
drew from the emi- 
nence, and Lee concen- 
trated his forces near the 
Antietam Creek, in the 
vicinity of Sharpsburg. 




BATTLE-FIELD ON SOUTH MOUNTAIN.' 



1 Page 584. 

' Lee issued a proclamation [Sept. 8], and raised the standard of revolt. He called upon the 
Marylanders to join his invading host, assuring tliem that he had come to assist them in throw- 
ing off "the foreign yoke" they were compelled to bear, and to "restore the independence and 
sovefeignty of their State." He discoursed fluently concerning the " outrages " and indig- 
nities inflicted upon them by their ever-generous National government ; but his appeals 
-were met by unexpected coldness. He found that the few disloyal Marylanders who had 
joined liis army in Virginia did not represent the great mass of the people of that State. 
He lost more by desertion than he gained by recruits in Maryland. 

^ McClellan's advance, on entering Frederick, found a copy of Lee's general order, issued on 
the 9th, which revealed his plan. 

■* McClellan reported his loss in this engagement at 1,5G8, of whom 312 were killed. The 
Confederates lost about the same number in killed and wounded, and 1.500 prisoners. 

* This shows the part of the battle-field where General Reno was killed. The stone near the 



1862.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. g29 

All eyes were now turned toward Harpers Ferry, then in command of 
Colonel D. H. Miles, a Marylander. Franklin fought his way over the moun- 
tain at Crampton's Pass into Pleasant Valley, and on the evening of the ] 4th 
of September he was within six miles of Harper's Ferry, then strongly invested 
by troops under " Stonewall Jackson." They had possession of Maryland and 
Loudon Heights, which completely commanded that post. Its salvation from 
capture depended upon the ability of the garrison to hold out until relief 
should come. But Miles, either incompetent or.disloyal, sent off his cavalry, 
two thousand strong, on the night of the 14th, and surrendered to Jackson 
the next morning, before the victorious Franklin could make his way thither.' 

McClellan followed the Confederates in their flight from South Mountain on 
the morning of the loth [Sept., 1862], but Avas so impressed with the idea that 
they were on his front in overwhelming numbers, that he deferred an attack 
until the next day. The Confederates were posted along the right bank of tlie 
Antietam, and the ISTationals on its left; and on the morning of the 16th the 
former opened artillery upon the latter. It was past noon before McClellan 
Avas ready, there being a lack of ammunition and rations, for which he Avaited_ 
Finally, Hooker crossed the Antietam on the extreme left of the Confederates^ 
and other troops were sent over during the night. Hooker's force had a shar]> 
and successful fight, and rested on their arms that night ; and both armies pre- 
pared for a decisive struggle in the morning. Hooker opened it at dawn on 
the Confederate left, and with varying fortunes the l)attle raged on tliat Aving 
and along the center until late in the afternoon. MeauAvhile the National left, 
under Burnside, had been contending Avith the Confederate right under Long- 
street, Avith A^aried success '^ and when darkness fell upon the scene that niglit,,, 
both armies, sorely smitten, rested Avhere for tAvelve or fourteen hours they 
had contended, the advantage being Avith the Nationals.- 

The Confederates Avere noAV in a perilous position. Lee couM not easily" 
call re-enforcements to his aid, his supplies Avere nearly exhausted, and his- 
army was terribly shattered and disorganized. McClellan, on the contrary, 
had fourteen thousand fresh troops near, and these joined him the next morn- 
ing. It Avould have been an easy matter, it seems, to liaAC captured the Avhole 
of Lee's army by a Angorous moA'ement. Prudential considerations restrained 
McClellan,^ and when he was ready to move on his foe, thirty-six hours after 
the battle [Sept. 18], Lee, Avith his shattered legions, were behind strong bat- 
teries on the Virginia side of the Potomac, AAdiither they had fled imder the- 

figure with a cane marks the spot where he fell. The chestnut tree was scarred bj- bullets whea 
the writer visited the field, iu tiie autumn of 1866. 

' The number of men surrendered was 11,583, most of them new levies. The spoils were 73 
cannon, 13,000 small arms, 200 wagons, and a large quantity of supplies. 

* In this battle McClellan's effective force was 87.000, and Lee's 60,000. McClellan reported 
his entire loss at 12,469 men, of whom 2.010 were killed. Among the latter was General J. K. 
P. Mansfield, and General Richardson Avas mortally wounded. Lee's loss was probably .somewhat 
larger. Six thousand of his men were made prisoners, and the spoils were 15,000 small arras, 13 
cannon, and 39 battle-flags. 

^ In his report ho said: — " Virginia was lost, Washington menaced, Maryland invaded — the 
National cause could afford no risks of defeat." He therefore hesitated, and. in opposition to the 
advice of Franklin and others, deferred a renewal of the battle until Lee had placed the Poto- 
mac between the two armies. 



630 



THE NATION. 



[1862. 



cover of darkness the night before. A feeble attempt to follow was made, and 
<|uickly abandoned [Sept. 19], when Lee moved leisurely up the Shenandoah 
Valley, and McClellan took jiossession of Harper's Ferry. He now called for 
j-e-enforcements and supplies, and ten days after the battle, the government 
niid the loyal people, who hourly expected the announcement that the Army 
of the Potomac was in swift pursuit of Lee's broken columns, were sadly dis- 
appointed by McClellan's declaration that he intended to hold his army where 
it was, and " attack the enemy should he attempt to recross into Maryland." 
The President hastened to McClellan's head-quarters [Oct. l], and there became 




VIEW OF THE ANTIETAM BATTLE-GKOUND. ' 

SO well satisfied that the army was competent to move at once in pursuit of 
Lee, that he instructed its leader to cross the Potomac immediately for that 
purpose. Twenty days were spent in correspondence between the commander 
of the Army of the Potomac and the National authorities before that order 
Avas obeyed, during which time the beautiful October weather, when the roads 
Avere good in Virginia, had passed by, and Lee's army had become thoroughly 
i-ecruited, strengthened, and supplied, and his communication Avith Richmond 
was re-established. On the 2d of November McClellan announced that his 



' This was the appearance of that portion of the battle-ground where the struggle was most 
•severe, on the Confederate left, as it appeared when the author sketched it, early in October, 
1866. The five birds seen in the distance are over the spot where Mansfield was killed. The 
Antietam Creek is seen in the foreground. The view is from near the house of Mr, Prj, where 
McClellan had his head-quarters. 



1S62.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



631 



whole army was once more in Virginia, prepared to move southward, on the 
east side of the Blue Ridge, instead of pursuing Lee up the Shenandoah Val- 
ley, on the western side. Tlie faith of the government and of the loyal people 
in McClellan's ability or disposition to achieve a victory by such movement 
was now exhausted, and on the 5th of November he was relieved of command, 
and General Burnside was put in his place. Thus ended McClellan's unsuccess- 
ful military career. 

Burnside now reorganized the Army of the Potomac (then numbering about 
one hundred and twenty thousand men) and changed the plan of ojierations, 
by which the captui-e of Richmond, rather than the immediate destruction of 
Lee's army, was the objective. He made Aquia Creek, on the Potomac, his 
base of supplies, and took position at PVedericksburg, from which he intended 
to advance. Before he had accomplished that movement and was prepared to 
cross the Rappahannock, Lee had occupied the heights in rear of Fredericks- 
burg, in full force, full eighty thousand strong. The bridges were destroyed, 
and Burnside could pass the river only on pontoons or floating bridges. These 
were constructed, and under cover of a heavy fire of artillery from Stafford 
Heights, the National columns crossed over. A sanguinary battle ensued on the 
13th of December. Ter- ^_ 

rible was the roar of 
three hundred Confede- 
rate cannon and half 
that number of Na- 
tional guns. The city 
w^as battered and fired. 
The Nationals were re- 
pulsed.' Two days 
more [December 14- 
15] they remained on 
the city side of the 
river, and then with- 
drew under cover of 
the darkness, and Lee 
took possession of Fred- 
ericksburg. Burnside 
was soon afterward 
superseded in com- 
mand [January 26, 1S63] by General Joseph Hooker. Here we will leave the 
Army of the Potomac, in winter quarters on the Rappahannock, and consider 
the stirring events in the great Valley of the Mississippi. 

We left the Lower Mississippi, from its mouth to New Orleans, in posses- 




SCENK IN FREDERICKSBURG ON THE MORNING OP THE 12TH. 



' The National loss was about 15,000 men. A large number of the wounded (seventy per 
/)ent.) soon rejoined the army, their hurts being slight. There were 3,234 of the total loss 
reported "missing." many of whom soon returned, so that the absolute loss to the army, other 
than temporary, was not Very large. The Confederate loss was probably about 7,000. 



632 



THE NATION. 



[18621 



sion of the National forces under Butler and Farragut' at the "beginning of the 
summer of 1862, and at the same time the river was held by the same power 
from Memphis to St. Louis. Southern Tennessee and Northern Alabama and 
Mississippi were also held by the Nationals, and the Confederate army, driven 
from Corinth, was at Tupelo.** At about this time a Kentuckian, named John. 
H. Morgan, and a" notorious leader of a guerrilla band who had penetrated his 
native State from East Tennessee, was raiding through that commonwealth^ 
preparatory to the advent, under E. Kirby Smith, of an invading force of 
Confederates, the advance of an army under General Bragg. Another bold 
leader of Confederate horsemen was N. B. Forrest, who swept throfigh Ten- 
nessee in various directions, and finally, at the middle of July, threatened 




FORTIFICATIOXS OF xfaE STATE-HOUSE AT NASEVH-LE.' 

Nashville, then in command of General Negley, who had caused fortification* 
to be built at points around the city, and breastworks to be throAvn up around 
the State capitol in its midst. In the mean time Bragg was moving through 
the State eastward of Nashville, toward Kentucky, while General Buell was 
moving in the same direction, on a nearly parallel line, to foil his intentions. 

General E. Kirby Smith, with a considerable force, entered Kentucky from 
East Tennessee, and pushed on in the direction of Frankfort, the capital of the 



' Page 611. ' Page 604. 

' This is a view of the breastworks at one of the fronts of the capitol. seen near the three 
smaller figures, with a portion of the city, the Cumberland River, and the country arc uud, as they 
appeared when sketched by tlie writer in May, 1866. 



1862.1 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



63S 



State. He fought a severe battle [August 30, 1862] with Union troops under 
General M. D. Manson, near Richmond, Avhere General Xelson' took command. 
The Nationals were routed ancl scattered, and Smith passed on to Lexington. 
The affrighted Legislature of Kentucky, then in session at Frankfort, fled to 
Louisville. The secessionists of that region warmly welcomed the invader, 
and the conqueror pushed vigorously toward the Ohio, Avith the intention of 
capturing and plundering Cincinnati. He was unexpectedly confronted there 
by strong fortifications constructed and a large force collected on the southern 
side of the Ohio, under the direction of the energetic General Lewis Wallace, 
By these 'the career of the invader was checked, the city was saved, and Wal- 
lace received the thanks of the authorities of Cincinnati and of the Legislature 
of Ohio, for " the promptness, energy, and skill exfiibited by him in organizing 
the forces and planning the defenses " which saved the soil of that State from 
invasion.^ Foiled in this attempt. Smith turned his face toward Louisville- 
He captured Frankfort,^ and there awaited the arrival of Bragg, Avho for almost 
three weeks had been moving northward from Chattanooga, with over fortj" 
regiments of all arms and forty cannon. His destination was Louisville. 

Bragg crossed the Cumberland River at Carthage, and entered Kentucky 
on the 5th of September, his advance, eight thousand strong, pushing toward 
the railway between Nashville and Louisville. At Mumfordsvillc, on that 
railway, a National force under Colo- 
nel T. J. Wilder fought [September 14] 
some of the troops of the disloyal Buck- 
ner for five hours, and repulsed them. 
Two days afterward, a strong Confede- 
rate force under General Polk appeared, 
and, after another severe battle [Sep- 
tember 16], Wilder was compelled to 
surrender. Bragg was elated by this 
event. Buell, then at BoAvling Green, 
had sent no relief to Wilder, and he 
seemed to be so exceedingly tardy, that 
the Confederate leader had no doubt of 
an easy march upon Louisville. On the 
1st of October he formed a junction 
with Kirby Smith's troops at Frank- 
fort, and his marauding bands were out plundering the people in all direc- 
tions.^ Then Buell, who had kept abreast of Bragg, turned upon the latter^ 




DON CAELOS BUELL. 



1 Page 577. 

" Wallace was satisfied that nothing but the most vigorous measures would save the city. 
Re declared martial law, and ordered t;ie citizens, under the direction of the Mayor, to assemble 
an hour afterward, in convenient public places, to be organized for work on intrenchments on the 
south side of the river. "The willing," he said, "shall be properly credited, the unwilling 
promptly visited. The principle adopted is : citizens for labor — soldiers for the battle." 

^ There Bragg perfc7med the farce of making a weak citizen, named Hawes, "Provisional 
Governor of Kentucky." 

* On tlie 15th of September Bragg issued a proclamation to the inhabitants of Kentucky, assu- 
riog them that he came is their •'liberator from the tyranny of a despotic ruler." He told them 



^34 T^^ NATION. [1862. 

and near Perry ville they had a severe battle on the 8th [October, 1862], 
in which the Confederates were so roughly Ij^ndled that they fled during 
the night, and made their way as raj^idly as possible toward East Tennessee.' 
Bragg pretended that he expected a general uprising in Kentucky in favor 
of the Confederate cause on his arrival, and Avas greatly disappointed. His 
invasion proved a disaster rather than a benefit. It might have proved utterly 
ruinous had the invaders been vigorously pursued in their retreat, but General 
Buell, like General McClellan, was too cautious to secure all of the advantages 
of a victory. The government perceived this, and at the close of October 
relieved him of his command, and gave it to General Rosecrans.** Then the 
title of his large force, called the Army of the Ohio, was changed to that of 
the Army of the Cumberland. 

Simultaneously with the movement of Bragg toward Kentucky, w^as an 
advance of Generals Van Dorn and Price (who had been left in Mississippi) 
toward Tennessee ; and strong bands of Confederates, under different leaders, 
were raiding through the western portion of that State, all working in aid of 
Bragg's movement. Rosecrans was then at the head of the Army of the 
Mississippi, whose duty was to hold the region in Northern Mississippi and 
Alabama which the capture of Corinth^ and the operations of Mitchel* had 
secured to the Nationals. He w^as at Tuscumbia when word came from Grant 
that danger was gathering west of him. He moved his main force toward 
Oorinth, when Price advanced to luka Springs,* and captured a large amount 
of National property there. 

General Grant, in chief command in that region, had watched these move- 
ments very vigilantly, and now he sent a force under General Ord to co- 
operate with Rosecrans against Price. Before Ord's arrival, Rosecrans, 
with a greatly inferior force, attacked Price [September 19], and, in a severe 
battle near the village of luka Springs, the Confederates were beaten.* 



he must have supphes for his army, but that they should be fairly paid for. He had neither 
means nor intention to do so. He plundered the people, witliout inquiring whether they 
were his friends or foes ; and he started to flee from the State with a wagon train of stolen sup- 
plies forty miles in length, but so fearful was he of capture that he left a large portion of his 
plunder behind. In truth, the invasion of Kentucky by Kirby Smith and Braxton Bragg was 
nothing but a great plunderiug raid, and the wealth of that State and of Southern Indiana and 
■Ohio was the chief object of their march from the Tennessee toward the Ohio River. 

' Buell's entire army numbered at this time about 100,000 men. Bragg's force in Kentucky 
was about 65,000. Only portions of each army were in the battle near Perry ville. Buell reported 
that his force which advanced on Bragg was 58,000 strong, of whom 22,000 were raw troops. 
He reported his loss in the battle at 4,348, of whom 916 were killed. Among the slain were 
■(renerals Jackson and Terrell. The Confederate loss is supposed to have been nearly the same. 
Bragg claimed to have captured 15 guns and 400 prisoners. 

■•' Page 563. * Page 604. * Page 601. 

' This is a celebrated summer resort for the people in the Gulf region. It is on the Memphis 
and Charleston railway, a few miles east of Corinth. 

' The disparity of numbers in this engagement was very great. "I say boldly," reported 
General Hamilton, on the 23d of September, "that a force of not more than 2,800 met and con- 
fronted a rebel force of 11,000, on a field chosen by Price, and a position naturally very strong." 
Only a small portion of Rosecrans's force was engaged, and these won the victory, but with fearful 
loss to the few National regiments in the fight. The men of the 11th Ohio Battery suffered 
dreadfully. Seventy-two were slain or wounded, and ah tlie horses were killed before the guns 
were abandoned. The appearance of their burial-place on the battle-field, when the writer visited 
%Le spot, in the spring of 1866, is seen m the engraving on the next page. Rosecrans reported his 



1862.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



635 



They fled southward, pursued some distance by the victors, and at Uipley, in 
Mississippi, the forces of Van Dorn and Price were united. Then they moved 
upon Corinth, now occu- ^_ 

pied by Rosecrans, and 
there, on tlie 3d and 4th 
of October [1862], a san- 
guinary battle was fought, 
in which both parties dis- 
played the greatest valor. 
The Nationals were be- 
hind the fortifications, 
and had some advantage 
in that respect.' The 
struggle was fearful, and 
ended in the repulse of 
the assailants, who fled 
southward, vigorously 
pursued as far as Ripley.' 

The repulse of the Confederates at Corinth was followed by brief repose 
in the department over which General Grant liad chief command. But there 
were stirring scenes lower down the Mississippi River. Tlie liills about the 
■city of Yicksburg had been covered with fortifications, and the capture of this 
point, and the works at Port Hudson below, Avhich constituted the only for- 
midable obstructions to a free navigation of the river, was now an object 
toward which military movements in tlie Southwest were tending. Curtis, 
whom we left, after the battle of Pea Ridge, marching eastward,^ was making 
his way toward Helena for that purpose, and the forces under Butler and 
Farragut were at Avork for the same end. So early as the 7th of May 
[1862], Baton Rouge, the capital of Louisiana, had been captured, and Far- 




'i,f>^^,/'"" 



GRAVKS OF THE ELEVENTH OHIO BATTERY-MEN. 



loss in this battle at 782, of whom 144 were killed. He estimated the Confederate loss at 1,438. He 
captured from them 1.629 small arms and 13.000 rounds of ammunition and other war materials. 
' The fortifications thrown up around Corinth by the Confederates had been strengthened by 
the Nationals and new batteries constructed. At one of these, called Fort 
Robinet, the struggle was very severe. In four lines Texans and Missis- 
sippians approached to assail it, in the face of a terrible storm of grape and 
canister shot. They reached the ditch, paused for a moment, and then, with 
a brave leader (Colonel Rogers) bearing the new Confederate flag* in his 
hand, they attempted to scale the parapet, when the concealed Nationals 
behind suddenly arose, and poured murderous volleys of bullets upon them 
that swept them down by scores. 

^ In this retreat troops under General Ord had a severe battle at Davis's 
Bridge, on the Hatcheo River, with a part of Van Dorn's column, m which 
the Union general was severely wounded. Ro.secrans reported his loss in 
the battle at Corinth and in the pursuit at 2,3,)9, of whom 315 were killed. 
He estimated the Confederate loss, including 2,248 prisonens, at a little more 
than 9,000. Among the trophies were fourteen flags, two guns, and 3,363 
small arms. Roseerans reported that, according to Confederate authoritj-, 
they had 38,000 men in the battle, and that his own force was less than 20,000. 
=* Page 592. 

• By a recent Act of the Confcdei-tite " Coiisrress," the "Stars anfl Bars" of the first Confederate flag [page565J 
bad been superseded by a white flag, the st.irs on a blue field arranged in the form of a cross. 




■CONPKDKEATK FLAG.' 



636 



THE NATION. 



[18G2. 




DAVID G. FARRAGUT. 



ragut's vessels went up to Yicksburg and exchanged greetings with others 
that came down from Memphis. Vicksburg was attacked on the 26th of 

June, and Farragut, with his flag-ship 
[Sartford) and other vessels, ran by 
and above it. He besieged Vicksburg, 
and attempted to cut a canal across the 
peninsula in front of it, so as to avoid 
the city and its fortifications altogether. 
But these operations failed, and the 
fleet went down the river. Not long 
afterward the National troops at Baton 
Rouge, under General Williams, were 
assailed [August 5, 1862] by Confede- 
rates under Breckinridge. Williams 
was killed, but the Confederates were 
repulsed,' and this result was followed 
by the destruction of the formidable 
Confederate ram Arkansas'^ [August 6] 
by the JEsscx, Captain Porter, and two other gun-boats. Then Porter went 
up the river to rconnoiter, and on the Yth of September he had a sharp fight 
with the growing batteries at Port Hudson. 

At the beginning of September General Butler was satisfied that the Con- 
federates had abandoned all idea of attempting to retake Xew Orleans, so he 
sent out some aggressive expeditions. The most important of these was for 
the purpose of " repossessing" the rich La Fourche district of Louisiana. The 
command of it was intrusted to General Godfrey Weitzel. He soon accom- 
plished the task, after a shai-p engagement [October 27] near Labadieville, in 
which he lost eighteen killed and seventy-four wounded, and captured two 
hundred and sixty-eight prisoners. A large portion of Louisiana, bordering on 
the western shore of the Mississippi, was brought under the National control 
before the close of the year,^ when General Butler was relieved of the command 
of the Department of the Gulf, and General Banks became [December 16] his 
successor. 

In the mean time there had been active military movements in Missouri 
and Arkansas. Since the autumn of 1861, General J. M. Schofield had been in 
command in the former State, and Avith twenty or thirty thousand men, scat- 
tered over the commonwealth, he made successful warfare on the Confederate 



' The National loss was 371, of whom 82 were killed. The Confederate loss is unknown- 
One hundred of the latter were made prisoners. 

" This ram was built in the Yazoo River, in the rear of Yicksburg, and was intended to 
sweep the National giui-boats from the Mississippi. She came down to assist Breckinridge in tlie 
i^ssault on Baton Rouge. Five miles above that place she was attacked, driven ashore, set orr 
fire by lier commander, and by the explosion of her magazine was blown into fragments. 

^ The rebellion had paralyzed the industrial operations in that region, and General Butle^ 
tliought it expedient, as a State polic\% and for the sake of humanity, to confiscate tbe entire 
property of La Fourche di^^trict. He appointed a commission to take charge of it, who employed 
the negroes and saved the crops. Two Congressional districts were "repossessed," and in De> 
cember the loj'al citizens of New Orleans elected two members of Congress. 



1862.] 



L I X C L X ' .S A D M I X I S T R A T I X , 



637 



guerrilla bands late iu the summer of 1862. From April until September of 
that year, about one liundred battles and skirmishes occurred in Missouri. 
Troops from Arkansas, who came thither to aid their insurgent brethren, were 
driven back. These formed a nucleus for a force which, late in September, 
Avas gathered in Arkansas, full forty thousand strong, under T. C. liindman, a 
former member of Congress. Against these Schofield marched with what was 
called the Army of the Frontier. Joining General J. G. Blunt, in the southern 
part of Missouri, the combined forces, ten thousand strong, sought the insur- 
gents. The latter were shy, and hovered cautiously among the Ozark Hills, 
A portion of them were attacked near Maysville [October 22] by Blunt, and 
driven in disorder into the Indian country. Six days afterward, another por- 
tion, mostly cavalry, were struck by General Francis J. Ilerron, and driven to 
the mountains. Soon after this ill liealth compelled Schofield to leave the 
field, and the command devolved on General Blunt. 

Hindman now determined to strike a decisive blow for the recovery of his 
State. Toward the close of November he had collected an army about twenty 
thousand strong on its western border. His advance was attacked by Blunt 
on the Boston Mountains on the 26th of that month, and Avere driven tow^ard 
Van Buren, when Blunt took position at Cave Hill. Hindman, with about 
eleven thousand men, marched from Van Buren to crush him. Bhint sent for 
Herron, then in Missouri, to come and help him. He did so, and at a little 
settlement called Prairie Grove, on Illinois Creek, they utterly defeated Hind- 
man in a severe battle, and drove his shattered army over the mountains. In 
the mean time there was bloody strife in Texas, Avhere Confederate rule was 
supreme, and the Unionists there sufiered the rigors of a reign of terror 
unparalleled in atrocity. Some attempts had been made to "repossess" impoi- 
tant points of that State, especially the 
city of Galveston. So early as May, 
1862, a demand for the surrender of 
that city had been made by the com- 
mander of a little squadron and refused, 
and so matters remained until the 8th 
of October, when the civil authorities 
of Galveston surrendered it to Com- 
mander Renshaw, of the National navy. 

Let us now see what was occurring 
eastward of the Mississippi, bearing 
upon the capture of Vicksburg, at the 
close of 1862. Grant had then moved 
the bulk of his army to the region of 
Holly Springs, in Mississippi, Avhere he 
was confronted by Van Dorn ; and 
Rosecrans, who succeeded Buell,' was moving southw^ard from Nashville. 

Rosecrans found the Army of the Ohio (now the Army of the Cumberland) 




WILLIAM S. ROSECRANS. 



Page 634. 



638 



THE NATION. 



[1862, 



in a sad condition — wasted in substance by marches and conflicts, and de- 
moralized by lack of success — "its spirit broken, its confidence destroyed, 
its discipline relaxed, its courage weakened, and its hopes shattered.'" Its 
effective force was only sixty-five thousand, and its cavalry was weak in 
number and equipment, while the rough-riders of Forrest and Morgan were 
very strong and bold. That army was in the vicinity of Bowling Green and 
Glasgow when Rosecrans took command of it, and Bragg had concentrated 
his forces at Murfreesboro', below Nashville, from which went out expeditions 
that seriously threatened the latter city. Perceiving its peril, Rosecrans moved 
in that direction at the beginning of November, and very severe encounters 
between his forces and Bragg's w^arned the latter that he had now a loyal, 
earnest, and energetic leader to deal with, and he became circumspect. 

Rosecrans prepared to move upon Bragg, and on the morning of the 26th 
of December, the bulk of his army, about forty-five thousand in number, went 
forward, and, after various preliminary operations, it appeared before the Con- 
federate post at Murfreesboro' on the 29th of December. Both armies made 
vigorous preparations for battle. Rosecrans had among his subordinate leaders 
Generals McCook,Thomas, Crittenden, Rousseau, Harker, Palmer, Sheridan, J. C. 
Davis, Wood, Van Cleve, Hazen, Negley, Mathews, and others ; and Bragg had 
Polk, Breckinridge, Ilardee, Kirby Smith, Cheatham, "Withers, Cleborne, and 
Wharton. The armies lay upon each side of Stone's River, within cannon-shot 
distance of Murfreesboro'. There a most sanguinary battle was begun on the 
morning of the 31st [Dec, 1862], and raged until evening with varied success, 

when the Nationals 
had lost very heavily 
in men and guns, but 
were not disheartened.'- 
The gallant Rosecrans 
had been seen at every 
post of danger during 
the battle, and his men 
had perfect confidence 
in him. 



felt sure of victory, and 
expected to find his foe 
in full retreat before 
morning. He was mis- 
taken. There was Rose- 
crans ready for battle. 
The astonished Bragg 
moved cautiously, and 




ih£< 



MONUMENT ERECTED BY HAZEN S BRIGADE. 



' Annals of the Army of the Cumberland, by John Filch. 

^ To the brigade of Acting Brigadier-General W. B. Hazen was freely given the honor of 
saving the df^y for the Nationals. Upon his gallant band the brunt of battle fell at a critical 
moment, when his thirteen hundred men, skillfully handled, kept thousands at bay, and stayed 



1863] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. ggg. 

the sum of that day's [Jan. 1, 1863] operations was some heavy skirmishing. 
On the following morning [Jan. 2] the conflict was renewed. The struggle 
was terrific. Both sides massed their batteries and plied them with destruc- 
tive effect. For a time it seemed as if mutual annihilation would be the result. 
Finally, a charge by seven National regiments' decided the day. The Con- 
federates Avere scattered by it, and in the space of twenty minutes they lost 
two thousand men. So ended, in complete victory for the Nationals, the battle 
of Stone's River or Murfreesboro'.'' Bragg retreated to Tullahoma, in the direc- 
tion of Chattanooga, and Rosecrans occupied Murfreesboro'. Such continued 
to be the relative position of the two armies for several months afterward. 

While for more than a year and a half the National armies had been striv- 
ing to crush the gigantic rebellion, the loyal people and the government had 
been contemplating the propriety of striking a withering blow at the unrigh- 
teous Labor System, for the spread and perpetuation of which the war was 
waged by the Secessionists and their friends. The subject of slavery, and its 
abolition, as a war measure, occupied much of the attention of Congress dur- 
ing its session in the winter of 1861-62. The public mind had been fbr a 
long time excited by the conduct of several military commanders who had 
returned fugitive slaves to their masters. This was forbidden by law ; and 
the Republican party* in Congress pressed with earnestness measures looking 
to the emancipation of the slaves as a necessary means for suppressing the 
rebellion. The President, kind and forbearing, proposed to Congress to co-ope- 
rate with any State government whose inhabitants might adopt measures for 
emancipation, by giving pecuniary aid ; but the slave-holders everywhere 
refused to listen to any propositions tending to such result. So Congress 
abolished slavery in the District of Columbia, over which it had control ; and 
finally that body gave the Chief Magistrate discretionary power to declare the 
emancipation of all slaves in States where rebellion existed, imder certain con^ 
ditions, and to employ them in the armies of the Republic. Accordingly, on 
the 22d of September, 1862, the Chief Magistrate declared it to be his purpose 
to issue a proclamation on the first of January, ] 863, pronouncing forever free 
the slaves within any State or designated parts of a State, the people whereof 
should then be in rebellion. At this the Secessionists sneered, and their 
friends compared the proclamation to " the Pope's bull against a comet ; " and 
on the designated day the insurgents were more rampant tlian ever. The Presi- 
dent, who had hoped that kindness might afEect the misled people, now saw that 

the tide of victory for the Confederates, which had been rolling steadily forward for hours. On 
the spot where the struggle occurred Hazen's men erected a monument to the memory of their 
slain comrades. 

' The 19th Illinois, 18th, 21st, and 74th Ohio, 78th Pennsylvania, 11th Michigan, and 37th 
Indiana. 

» Rosecrans officially reported his loss at nearly 12,000 men, while Bragg estiTnnted it at 24.000. 
Rosecrans had 1,533 killed. Bragg admitted a loss of 10,000 on his part, of whom 9,000 were 
killed and wounded. Among the killed were Generals Rains and Hanson. 

While the movements of the two armies were tending toward the decisive battle, Bragg'* 
superior cavalry were raiding over Western Tennessee, to prevent communication between Gran^ 
and Rosecrans, and to strike the communications of the latter with Nashville. At about the sam^ 
time a successful counter-raid into East Tennessee was made by General S, P. Carter. 

» Page 529. 



^40 ^^^^ NATIOX. - [1863. 

every concession was spurned with scorn, and on the designated day [January 
1, 1863], lie issued the threatened Proclamation of Emancipation.' Then the 
shackles fell from the limbs of three millions of slaves ; and from that hour 
when the nation, by its chosen head, proclaimed that act of justice, the power 
of the rebellion began to Avane. The conspirators were struck with dismay, 
for they well knew that it was a blow fatal to their hopes. It touched with 
mighty power a chord of sympathy among the aspirants for genuine freedom 
in the elder world ; and from that hour the prayers of true men in all civilized 

' The following is a copy of that proclamation : 

Whereas, On the 22d day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred 
and sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President of the United States, eontammg, 
among other things, the following, to wit : 

"That on the 1st day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and 
sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people 
whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and for- 
ever free ; and the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval 
authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or 
-acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual 
freedom. 

"That the Executive will, on the first day of January aforesaid, by proclamation, designate 
the States and parts of States, if any, in whicli the people thereof, respectively, shall then be in 
rebelhon against tl^e United States ; and the fact that any State, or the people thereof, shall on 
that day be in good faith represented in the Congress of the United States, by members chosen 
thereto at elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such State shall have participated, 
phall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive evidence that such 
State, and the people thereof, are not then in rebellion against the United States." 

Now, therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, by virtue of the power 
in me vested as Commander-in-Chief of the Army and N'avy of the United States in time of 
actual armed rebellion against the authority and Government of the United States, and as a fit 
and necessary war measure for suppressing said rebellion, do, on this first first day of January', 
in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and in accordance with my 
purpose so to do, publicly proclaimed for the full period of one hundred days from the day first 
above mentioned, order and designate, as the States and parts of States wherein the people 
thereof, respectively, are this day in rebellion against the United States, the foUowing, to wit: 

Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana (except the parishes of St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefierson, St. 
John, St. Charles, St. James, Ascension, Assumption, Terre Bonne, Lafourche, Ste. Marie, St. 
Martin, and Orleans, including the city of New Orleans), Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, 
South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia (except the forty-eight counties designated as West 
Virginia, and also the counties of Berkley, Acconiac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess 
Anne, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth), and which excepted parts 
are, for the present, left precisely as if this proclamation were not issued. 

And by vii'tue of the power and for the purpose aforesaid, I do order and declare that all per- 
sons held as slaves within said designated States and parts of States are, and henceforward shall 
"36 free ; and that the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and 
naval authorities thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of said persons. 

And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to be free to abstain from all violence, unless 
-n necessary self-defense; and I recommend to them that, in all cases when allowed, they labor 
faithfully for reasonable wages. 

And I further declare and make known that such persons, of suitable condition, will be 
received into the armed service of the United States, to garrison forts, positions, stations, and 
other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service. 

And upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of justice, warranted by the Constitution, 
'ipon military necessity, I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind, and the gracious favor of 
Almighty God. 

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my name, and caused the seal of the United States 
o be affixed. 

Done at the City of Washington, this first day of January, in the year of our Lord 
fi.. s.] one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United 
States the eighty-seventh. 

ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

By the President. 
William H. Seward, Secretary of State. 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



641 



lands went up to the throne of God in supplication for the success of the 
armies of the Republic against its enemies/ 

While the National government was thus working for the elevation of the 
race, the " Confederate States government " at Richmond was putting forth 
amazing energies in the prosecution of measures for the perpetuation of slavery. 
Their " Provisional Constitution '" had been succeeded by a " Permanent 
Constitution," and Jefferson Davis had been elected [Feb. 2'2d, 1862] "Perma- 
nent President " of the Confederacy for six years.* In the " Congress " at 
Richmond were delegates from all the Slave-labor States excepting Maryland 
and Delawai-e, and resolutions were adopted and measures were devised for 
prosecuting the war with the greatest vigor, declaring that they would never, 
" on any terms, politically affiliate with a people who were guilty of an inva- 
sion of their soil and the butchery of their citizens." With this spirit they 
prosecuted the war on land, and by the aid of some of the British aristo<?racy, 
merchants, and ship-builders, they kept afloat hostile craft on the ocean, that 
for a time drove most of the carrying trade between the United States and 
Europe to British ships. One of the most noted of these marauding vessels was 
the Alabama, built, equipped, armed, pro- 
visioned, coaled, and manned by the British,* 
and commanded by Raphael Semmes. She 
roamed the ocean a simple sea-robber ;' and 
during the last ninety days of 1862, she 
destroyed by fire no less than twenty-eight 
helpless American merchant vessels. While 
her incendiarism was thus illuminating the 
sea, the George Grisioold, laden with pro- 
visions, furnished by the citizens of New 
York who had suffered most by the piracies, 
was out upon the ocean, bearing a gift of 
food from them, valued at one hundred thou- 
sand dollars, to the starving English opera- 
tives in Lancashire, who had been deprived of 
work by the rebellion. And tliat ship of mercy vvai^ -convoyed by an American 




RAPHAEL SEMMES. 



' The first regiment of colored troops raised by the authority of an act of Congress was 
organized in Beaufort District, South Carohua; and on the day when this prochimatiou was 
issued, a native of that district (Dr. Brisbane), who had been driven away many years before 
because he emancipated his slaves, announced to these troops and other freed people the great 
fact that they were no longer in bonds. 

^ Page 547 

^ His immediate advisers, to whom he gave the titles of the cabinet ministers of his govern- 
ment at Washington, were Judah P. Benjamin, "'Secretary of State;" George W. Randolph, 
'^Secretary of War;" S. R. Mallory, "Secretary of the Navy;" C. G. Memminger, "Secretary of 
the Treasury;" Thomas H. Watts, "Attorney-General;" and John H. Reagan, "Postmastcr- 
Creneral." 

* Wh'de these vessels were a-building in England, and their destination was known, the 
American minister in London called the attention of the British government to the fact. He 
faded to elicit any action that might prevent their going to sea, fully manned and armed. It was 
painfully evident that the government was willing they should go to sea in aid of the rebellion. 

^ Immediately after the attack on Fort Sumter [page 553], Jefferson Davis recommended, and 
his fellow-disiinionists in " Congress " authorized, the employment of armed vessels to destroy 

41 



642 



THE NATION. 



[1865. 



ship of war to protect her from the torch of a foe lighted by British hands. 
The subsequent career of the Alabama will be considered hereafter. 
Let us now turn again to a consideration of military events. 
At the close of 1862, the Civil War was in full career. Up to that time 
the loyal people had furnished for the contest, wholly by volunteering, more 
than one million two hundred thousand soldiers, of whom, at the beginning of 
1863, about seven hundred thousand were in the service. The theate» of strife 
was almost co-extensive with the Slave-labor States, but the most important 
movements were those connected with preparations for a siege of Vicksburg, 
and the capture of Port Hudson, twenty-five miles above Baton Rouge. 
Between these places only, the Mississippi was free from the patrol of National 
war-vessels, and it was determined to break that link between the Confederates 
east and west of the river. For that purpose Grant concentrated his troops 
near the Tallahatchee, where the Confederates were strongly posted. Troops 
under Hovey and Washburne came over from Arkansas to co-operate with him, 
and early in December his main army was at Oxford, and an immense amount 

of his supplies were at Holly Springs, 
The latter, through the carelessness or 
treachery of the commander of their 
guard, were captured by Van Dorn on 
the 20th. This loss compelled Grant 
to fall back and allow a considerable 
Confederate force, under General J. C. 
Pemberton, to concentrate at Vicks- 
burg. 

Meanwhile, in accordance with 

Grant's instructions. General W. T. 

Sherman moved down the Mississippi 

from Memphis, with a strong force, and 

siege-guns, to beleaguer Vicksburg. 

Troops from Helena joined him at 

Friar's Point [Dec, 20], and there he 

was met by Admiral D. D. Porter, whose naval force was at the mouth of the 

Yazoo River, just above Vicksburg. The two commanders arranged a plan 

for attacking Vicksburg in the rear, by passing up the Yazoo a few miles and 




JOHN C. PEMBERTON. 



American shipping on the high seas. These, according to the laws of nations and the proper 
definition of the word, were pirates. A pirate is defined as "a robber on the high seas," and 
piracy, as "taking property from others by open violence, and without authority, on the eea." 
These vessels, and their officers and crews, answered this definition, for Davis and Toombs, who 
signed their commissions, were not " authorized" to do so by any real government on the face of 
the earth. The ' 'government" they represented had no more "authority" than Jack.Cade, Daniel 
Shays, Nat Turner, or John Brown. Hence these Confederate marauders were not " privateers." 
but " pirates." Semmes's vessel had neither register nor record, and no ship captured by her 
was ever sent into any port for adjudication. She had no acknowledged flag or recognized 
nationality. All the regulations of public justice which discriminate the legalized naval vessel 
from the pirate were disregarded. She had no accessible port into which to send her captives, 
nor any legal tribunal to adjudije her captures. She was an outlaw roving the seas, an enemj 
to mankind. 



1863.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 543 

reducing batteries along a line of blufts, by which approaches to it Avere 
defended. This was undertaken, but after a severe battle on the Chickasaw 
Bayou [Dec. 28, 1862], in which Sherman lost about 2,000 men, and his foe 
only 207, the Nationals were compelled to abandon the enterprise. At that 
moment [January 2, 1863] General McClernand' arrived, and, ranking Sher- 
man, took the chief command. 

Toward the middle of January the army and navy in the vicinity of Vicks- 
burg Avent up the Arkansas River and captured Fort Hindman, at Arkansas 
Post [January 11, 1863], a very important position. The fort and much valu- 
able property w^as destroyed.'' Meanwhile Grant had come down the river 
from Memphis, and arrangements were at once made for a vigorous prosecu- 
tion of the siege of Vicksbui-g. He organized his army into four corps,^ and 
encouraged the enlistment of colored men. He weighed well all proposed 
plans for the siege, and being satisfied that the post was too well fortified to 
warrant an attack on its river front, he determined to get in its rear. First 
the canal begun by Farragut* received his attention. It was a failure, and that 
project was abandoned. Other passages among the neighboring bayous were 
sought, and finally a strong land and naval force made its way into the Yazoo, 
with the intention of descending that stream, carrying the works at Haines's 
Bluff,^ and so gaining the rear of Vicksburg. The expedition was repulsed at 
Fort Pemberton, near Greenwood, late in March, and the enterpi-ise was aban- 
doned. Porter, with amazing energy and perseverance, tried other channel;-, 
but failed. A record in detail of the operations of the army and navy in that 
region, during the winter and spring of 1863, would fill a volume. 

In the mean time there were stirring scenes on the bosom of the Missis- 
sippi. Some of the war-vessels passed by the batteries at Vicksburg [Feb., 
1863], for the purpose of destroying Confederate gun-boats below, but were 
themselves captured.^ Later, when Grant had sent a strong force down tho 
west side of the river, under McClernand and McPherson, toward New Car- 
thage, Porter determined to run by Vicksburg with nearly his whole fleet, and 
the transports and barges. This was successfully done on the night of the 
16th of April. Six more transports performed the same perilous feat on the 
night of the 22d, and Grant prepared for vigorous operations against Vicks- 
burg on the line of the Big Black River, on its flank and rear. 

Let us now turn for a moment, and see what was occurring in the Depart- 
ment of the Gulf under General Banks, the successor of General Butler, Avho 

' Page 577. 

' The National loss was 980 men. The Confederates, to the number of 5,000, were made 
prisoners, and the spoils were 17 cannon, 3,000 small arms, and a large quantity of stores. 

' These were commanded respectively by Generals McClernand, Sherman, Hurlbut, and 
McPherson. 

* Page 636. 

' This was at the end of the range of bluffs extending from Vicksburg to the Yazoo. 

* One of them was the powerful iron-clad Indiamla. She was attacked, injured, and captured. 
While the Confederates were repairing her. Porter, one evening, sent down the river an old flat- 
boat, arranged so as to imitate a gun-boat or ram. It seemed very formidable, and drew the fire 
of the Vicksburg batteries as it passed sullenly by them. "Word was sent to warn Confederate 
vessels below, and the Jndianola was blown into fragments to prevent her being captured by this 
supposed ram. 



<644 



THE NATION. 



[1863. 



was co-operating with Grant against Vicksburg, and was also charged with the 
taslc of gaining possession of Louisiana and Texas. Galveston, as we have 
seen, was in possession of a National naval force.' Banks sent troops to its 
support, and on the morning of the first of January, 1863, the Confederates, 
under General Magruder,^ attacked the troops and the war-vessels. A severe 
struggle ensued, which resulted in the defeat of the Nationals. Galveston was 
repossessed by the Confederates, but on account of a vigorous blockade, at 
once established by Farragut, the victory was almost a barren one. 

Banks now turned his attention to the recovery of Louisiana west of the 
Mississippi, and along its shores. Already a force under General Grover occu- 
pied Baton Rouge; and early in January [1863] a land and naval force undei- 
>General Weitzel and Commodore Buchanan was sent into the Teche region, a 

country composed of fertile 
plantations, extensive forests, 
sluggish lagoons and bayous, 
and almost impassable swamps. 
The expedition was successful. 
Banks now concentrated his 
forces, about 12,000 si.rong, at 
Baton Rouge, for tho purpose 
of co-operating witk Admiral 
Farragut in an attempt to pass 
the now formidable batteries 
at Port Hudson. This was 
attempted on the night of the 
13th of March, when a terrible 
contest occurred in the gloom 
between the vessels and the 
land batteries. Only the flag- 
shij) {Hartford) and com- 
panion [Albatross] passed by. 
Then Banks again sent a large 
portion of his available force 
into the interior of Louisiana, 
where General Richai-d Taylor was in command of the Confederates. Thu 
troops were concentrated at Brashear City early in April, and moved trium- 
phantly through the country to the Red River, accompanied by the Depart • 
ment commander. At the close of the first week in May they were al 
Alexandria, on the Red River, where Banks announced tnat the power of the 
Confederates in Central and Northern Louisiana was broken. With this 
impression he led his troops to and across the Mississippi, and late in May 
invested Port Hudson. 

We left Grant, late in April, below Vicksburg, prej^ared for new operations 
against that post.^ By a most wonderful raid, performed by cavalry under 




LOUISI.^XA SWAMP. 



Page G37. 



rage 562. 



Page 643. 



1863] 



LINCOLN'S AD M I N 1 S T K AT TON. 



645- 



Colonel Grierson,, in the heart of Mississippi,' lie was satisfied that tlic bulk of 
the Confederate soldiers of that region were near Yieksburg, under Peraber- 
ton. So he prepared to act with vigor. Porter attacked and ran by [April 
29] the batteries at Grand Gulf, and Grant's army crossed the river at Bruins- 
burg, a little below, pushed on, and near Port Gibson gained a decisive vic- 
tory [May 1] over the Confederates." Meanwhile Sherman, who had been left 
to operate in the Yazoo region, and had made another unsuccessful attempt to 
capture Haines's Bluff,^ was ordered to march down the west side of the Mis- 
sissippi and join the main army. This junction Avas effected on the 8th of 
May, near the Big Black River, and the whole army pressed on toward Jack- 
son, the capital of Mississippi, where General Joseph E. Johnston was in com- 
mand. In a severe battle at Raymond [May 1 2], on the way, the Confederates 
were defeated.^ Such, also, was the result of a battle at Jackson [May 14], 
when the Confederates were driven northward, the city was seized, and a large 
amount of jjublic property was destroyed. Then the victors turned toward 
Yieksburg, and fought [May 16] a severe battle with the Confederates under 
Pemberton at Cliampion Hills, and were victorious.' Grant pressed forward,., 
and after a battle at the passage of the Big Black River [May 1 7], the Confede- 
rates were again driven. Grant crossed that stream, and on the 1 9tL of May^ 
his army, which for a fortnight had subsisted off the country, invested Yieks- 
burg, and received sup- 
]ilies from a base on the 
Yazoo established by 
Admiral Porter. 

Grant made an un- 
successful assault upon 
Yieksburg on the day 
of his arrival. x\nother, 
with disastrous effect on 
the Nationals, was made 
three days later [May 
22], when Porter with 
his fleet co-operated, and 
then Grant commenced 
a regular siege, which 
continued until the first 




CAVE-LIFE IN VICKSBURG. 



' Grierson left Lagrange, Tennessee, on tlie 17th of April, witli a body of cavalry, and swep-f 
through the country southiward, between the two railways running parallel with the Mississippi-: 
River, striking them here and there, smiting Confederate outposts, and destroying public propertj'_ 
At times his troops were scattered on detached service, rind often rode fifty and sixty miles a dhy;. 
over an exceedingly difficult country to travel in. They killed and wounded about 100 of the foe>- 
captured and paroled full 500 ; destroyed .3,000 stand of arms, and inflicted a loss on the ConfrJ-- 
erates of property valued at about $0,000,000. Grierson's loss was 27 men, and a number of 
]iorses. 

" The National loss was 840 men. They captured 3 guns, 4 flags, and 580 prisoners. 

^ Page 643. 

* The National loss was 442 men, and that of the Confederates 823. 

* The National loss was 2,457. The loss of the Confederates in the battle was about the 
same, besides 2,000 prisoners. 



646 ^SE NATION. 

week ill July, and produced the greatest distress in the city, and in the belea- 
gured camps. Shot and shell were hurled upon it daily from land and water, and 
the inhabitants were compelled to live in caves' cut in the clay hills on which 
Vicksburg is built,- as the only safe place for their persons. At length one of the 
j>rincipal forts was blown up by a mine made under it by the Nationals, and 
other mines were ready for their infernal work. Famine was stalking throuoh 
the city and the camps. Fourteen ounces of food had become the allowance 
for each person for forty-eight hours, and the flesh of mules had been pi-o- 
nounced a savory dish.^ Pemberton now lost all hope of aid from Johnston, 
in Grant's rear (who had been watching for an opportunity to strike the 
besiegers), or the salvation of his army, and on the 3d of July he offered to 
surrender. That event took place on the morning of the 4th, when 27,000 
men became prisoners of war, and the stronghold of Vicksburg passed into 
the possession of the National power.^ 

This victory, won simultaneously with another at Gettysburg, in Pennsyl- 
vania, produced unbounded joy in all loyal hearts. It was followed a few days 
later by the surrender of Port Hudson, which had been besieged by General 
Banks for forty days, his gallant troops at times performing great achievements 
of valor and fortitude. He had been ably supported by Farragut and his squad- 
ron. The missiles sent by the army and navy had caused great destruction witliin 
the fortifications. The ammunition and provisions of the garrison were nearly 
exhausted, and when news came of the fall of Vicksburg, General Gardner, 
the commander of Port Hudson, despairing of succor, surrendered the post, 
and its occupants and spoils, on the 9th of July. Then, for the first time in 

' The streets of Vicksburg are cut through the liills, and houses are often seen far above the 
street passengers. In the perpendicular banks formed by these cuttings, and composed of clay, 
caves v/ere dug at the beginning of the siege, some of them sufficiently large to accommodate 
whole families, and in some instances communicating with each other by corridors. Such was the 
character of some made on Main Street, opposite the house of Colonel Lyman J. Strong, for the 
i!se of his fomily and others, and of which the writer made the sketch on page 645, in April, 1866. 
These caves were then in a partially ruined state, as were most of them in and around Vicksburg, 
for rains had washed the banks away, or had caused the filling of the entrances. In this picture 
tlie appearance of the caves in their best estate is delineated, with furniture in accordance with 
descriptions given to the writer by the inhabitants. 

" "This da)'," wrote a citizen of Vicksburg in his diary, under date of June 30, "we heard of 
the first mule meat being eaten. Some of the officers, disgusted with the salt junk, proposed to 
slaughter some of the fat mules as an experiment; as, if the siege lasted, we must soon come to 
tliat diet. The soup from it was quite rich in taste and appearance. Some of the ladies ate of it 
without knowing the difference." 

' Grant and Pemberton met under a live-oak tree, on a slope of the hiU on which the fort that 
was blown up was situated, and there agreed upon terms of surrender. That tree was soon 
afterward cut down and converted into canes and other forms, as mementoes of the event. A 
marble monument, with suitable inscriptions, was afterward placed on the spot. It soon became 
mutilated, and in its place a 1 00-pounder iron cannon was erected, and suitably inscribed. 

G-eneral Grant thus stated the result of the operations of his army from Port Gibson to 
Vicksburg : " The result of this campaign has been the defeat of the enemy in five battles outside 
of Vicksburg; the occupation of Jackson, the capital of the State of Mississippi, and the capture 
of Vicksburg and its garrison and munitions of war ; a loss to the enemy of tliirty-seven thousand 
(37,000) prisoners, among whom were fifteen general officers; at least ten thousand killed and 
wounded (among the killed Generals Tracy, Tilghman, and Green), and himdreds, and perhaps 
thousands, of stragglers, who can never be collected and reorganized. Arms and munitions of 
war for an army of sixty thousand men have follon into our hands, besides a large amount of 
other public property, consisting of railroads, Icrcmutives, cars, steamboats, cotton, <fec., and much 
was destroyed to prevent our capturiug it." 



'■MM^: 



j&. fr-^^^"- 




imTrnmrnmr mmTwrnim ^mmT^mm wmmmmim^'m -. 



1863.] 



LINCOLN^ S ADMINISTRATION. 



647 



more than two years, every impediment to the free navigation of the Missis- 
sippi was removed. Powerful portions of the Confederacy were thus severed 
and weakened, and the loyal people of the land were jubilant with the hope 
and expectation that the end of the terrible strife was nigh. The blow dis- 
mayed the Secessionists, and the wiser men in the Confederacy clearly perceived 
that all was lost.' 



CHAPTER XVIII 



THE CIVIL WAR. [1861—1865.] 

While a portion of the National troops were achieving important vic- 
tories on the banks of the Lower Mississippi," those composing the Army of 
the Potomac w^ere winning an equally important victory not far from the 
banks of the Susquehanna. We left that army in charge of General Joseph 
Hooker after sad disasters at Fredericksburg;^ let us now observe its move- 
ments from that time until its triumphs in the conflict at Gettysburg, between 
the Susquehanna and Potomac rivers. 

From January until early in April, Hooker was employed in preparing the 
weakened and demoralized Army of the Potomac for a vigorous campaign. 
It lay on the northern side of the Rappahannock River, nearly opposite Freder- 
icksburg, and, with the exception of some slight cavalry movements, it remained 
quiet during nearly three months of rest and preparation. It was reorganized,^ 

' Tlie blow was unexpected to the Confederates. They knew how strong Vicksburg was, and 
were confident that the accomplished soldier. General Johnston, would compel Grant to raise the 
siege. Even the Ddily Citizen, a paper printed in Vicksburg, only two days before the surrender 
(July 2), talked as boastfully as if perfectly confident of success. In a copy before the writer, 
printed on wall-paper, the editor said: "The great Ulysses— the Yankee generalissimo surnamed 
Grant— has expressed his intention of dining in Vicksburg on Saturday next, and celebrating the 
Fourth of July by a grand dinner, and so forth. When asked if he would invite General Joe 
Johnston to join him, he said, ' No ! for fear there will be a row at the table.' fTZy.wes must get 
into the city before he dines in it. The way to cook a rabbit is, 'first catch the rabbit,' &c." In 
another paragraph, the Citizen eulogized the luxury of mule-meat and fricasseed kitten. 

- See page 646. " See page 631. 

■* The army was arranged in seven corps, named, respectively, the 1st, 2d, 3d, 5th, 6th, 11th, 
and 12th, and each was distinguished by peculiar badges, worn on the hat or cap, and composed 
«f scarlet, white, and blue cloth, made in the forms shown in the engraving, whose numbers cor- 
respond with those of the respective corps, as follow : — 




^ir^iif 




The corps composed twenty-three divisions; and at the close of April [1863], the army consisted 
of 110,000 infantrv and artillerv, with 400 guns, and a well-equipped cavalry force, 13.000 strong. 
The corps commanders were Generals J. F. Reynolds, D. N. Couch, D. E. Sickles, G. G. Meade, 
J. Sedgwick, 0. 0. Howard, and H. W. Slocuna. 



648 TS^ NATION. [1863. 

and weeded of incompetent and disloyal officers.' Measures were taken ta 
prevent desertions and to recall a vast number of absentees.' Order and dis- 
cipline were thoroughly established; and, at the close of April, Hooker found 
himself at the head of an army more tlian one hundred thousand in number, 
Avell disciplined, and in fine spirits. General Lee, in command of the Army 
of Northern Virginia, then lying on the Fredericksburg side of the Rappahan- 
nock, had been equally active in reorganizing, strengthening, and disciplining 
his forces. A vigorous conscription act was then in operation throughout the 
Confederacy, and in April, Lee found himself at the head of an army of little 
more than sixty thousand men of all arms,^ unsurpassed in discipline, and full 
of enthusiasm. A part of his army, under General Longstreet, was absent in 
Southeastern Virginia, confronting the troops of General J. J. Peck, .in the 
vicinity of Norfolk. Yet with his forces thus divided, Lee felt competent to 
cope with his antagonist, for he was behind a strong line of intrenchments 
reaching from Port Royal to Banks's Ford, a distance of about twenty-five 
miles. 

We have observed that only some cavalry movements disturbed the quiet 
of the Army of the Potomac in the winter and spring of 1863. Early in Feb- 
ruary the Confederate General W. H. F. Lee made an unsuccessful attempt to 
surprise and capture National forces at Gloucester, opposite Yorktown ; and 
at a little past midnight of the 8th of March, the notorious guerrilla chief, 
Moseby, with a small band of mounted men, dashed into the village of Fairfax 
Court-House. and carried away the Union commander there and some others. 
A few days later the first purely cavalry battle of the war occurred not far 
from Kelly's Ford, on the Rappahannock, between National troops under Gen- 
eral W. W. Averill and Confederates led by Fitz-Hugh Lee. Averill encoun- 
tered Lee while he was pushing on toward Culpepper Court-House, from the 
Rappahannock, when a severe contest ensued, and continued until late in the 
evening, when Averill retreated across the river, pursued to the water's edge 
by his foe. Each lost between seventy and one hundred men. 

Early in April, before the ranks of his army were full, Hooker determined 
to advance, his objective being Richmond, for the terms of enlistment of a 
large portion of his men would soon expire. He ordered General Stoneman to 

' There were officers in that army, high in rank, who were opposed to the pohcy of eman- 
cipating the slaves as a war measure, which, from the beginning, liad been contemplated by the 
government. The proclamation of the President to that effect developed this opposition in con- 
siderable strength, and this in connection with the active influence of a part of the Opposition 
party, known as the Peace Faction, upon the friends of tlie soldiers at home, had a most depress- 
ing effect upon the armJ^ The men were impressed with the idea that it was becoming a "war 
for the negro," instead of '■ a war for the Union." Officers known to be inclined to give such a 
tone of feeling to their men were replaced by loyal men, in active sympathy with the government 
in its efforts to crush the rebellion. 

* When Hooker took command of the army, he found the number of reported absentees to be 
2.922 commissioned officers and 81,964 non-commissioned officers and privates. This, doubtless, 
included all the deserters since the organization of the Army of the Potomac, and the sick and 
Avounded in the hospitals. It is estimated that 50,000 men, on the rolls of that army, were absent 
at the time we are considering, namely, the close of January, 1863. 

' Lee's army was composed of two corps, commanded respectively by Generals J. Longstreet 
and T. J. ("Stonewall") Jackson. His artillery was consohdated into one corps, under the com- 
mand of General Pendleton as chief. • _ 



1863,] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



649 




JOSEPH HOOKER. 



cross the Rappahannock with a large force of cavah-y, strike and disperse the 
horsemen of Fitz-Hugh Lee, of Stuart's cavahy, known to be at Culpepper 
Court-House, and then, pushing on to Gordonsville, turn to the left, and 
destroy the railways in the rear of 
Lee's army. Heavy rains, which made 
the streams brimful, foiled the move- 
ment at its beginning, and Stoneman 
and his followers swam their horses 
across the Rappahannock, and returned 
to camp. Hooker then paused for a 
fortnight, when he put his whole army 
in motion, for the purpose of turning 
Lee's flank, • He sent ten thousand 
mounted men to raid on his rear, and 
threw a large portion of his army 
(Fifth, Eleventh, and Twelfth Corps) 
across the Rappahannock, above Fred- 
ericksburg, with orders to concentrate 
at Chancellorsville, in Lee's rear, ten 

miles from that city. This was accomplished on the evening of the oOtb 
[April, 1863], when over thirty-six thousand troops threatened the rear of the 
Confederate army. 

Meanwhile, the left wing of Hooker's army (First, Third, and Sixth Corps), 
under General Sedgwick, left near Fredericksburg, had so completely masked 
the movements of the turning column, by demonstrations on Lee's front, that 
the latter was not aware of the peril that threatened his army until that 
column had crossed the Rappahannock, and was in full march on Chancellors- 
ville, Hooker expected Lee would turn and fly toward Richmond when he 
should discover this peril, but he did no such thing. On the contrary, he pro- 
ceeded to strike his antagonist a heavy blow, for the twofold purpose of 
securing the direct line of communication between the parts of Hooker's now 
severed army, and to compel him to fight, with only a part of his force, in a 
disadvantageous position, at Chancellorsville, which Avas in the midst of a 
region covered with a dense forest of shrub-oaks and pines, and tangled under- 
growths, broken by morasses, hills, and ravines, called The Wilderness, For 
this purpose, Lee put " Stonewall " Jackson's column in motion [May 1] toward 
Chancellorsville, at a little past midnight. 

Early in the morning Jackson was joined by other troops, and the whole 
force moved upon Chancellorsville by two roads. Hooker sent out a greater 
part of the Fifth and the whole of the Twelfth Corps, with the Eleventh in 
its support, to meet the advancing columns, A battle ensued ; and the efforts 
of Lee to seize the communications between the parts of Hooker's army, just 
alluded to, were foiled. But the Nationals were pushed back to their intrench- 
ments at Chancellorsville, and there took a strong defensive position. 

Both commanders now felt a sense of impending danger, for both armies 
were in a critical position in relation to each other. Hooker decided to rest on the 



^50 T H P: N A T I N . [1863. 

defensive, but Lee, in accordance with the advice of Jackson, took the bold aggres- 
sive step of detaching the whole of that leader's corps and sending it on a secret 
flank movement, to gain the rear of the National army. The movement was 
successfully made, though not entirely unobserved ; but the troops seen moving 
behind the thick curtain of The Wilderness thickets were supposed to be a 
part of Lee's army in retreat. While General Sickles, in command of that 
portion of the line where the discovery was made, was seeking positive knowl- 
edge in the matter, Jackson, who had gained the National rear, solved the 
problem by bursting suddenly from behind that curtain with twenty-five thou- 
sand men, falling suddenly and firmly upon Hooker's right, crumbling it into 
atoms, and driving the astounded column in wild confusion upon the remainder 
of the line. A general battle ensued, in Avhich the residue of the Confederate 
army, under the direct command of General Lee, participated, he having 
attacked Hooker's left and center. The conflict continued until late in the 
■evening, when the Confederates sustained an irreparable loss in the death of 
Jackson, who was accidentally shot, in the gloom, by his own men.* 

Hooker made new dispositions to meet the inevitable attack the following 
morning [May 3, 1863]. He had called from Sedgwick the First Corps, full 
twenty thousand strong, and it arrived that evening and swelled the National 
force at Chancellorsville to about sixty thousand men. He had also ordered 
Sedgwick to cross the Rappahannock at once, seize and hold the town and 
heights of Fredericksburg, and push the bulk of his force with all possible 
haste along the roads to Chancellorsville. He also changed a portion of the 
front of his own line so as to receive the expected attack. During the night 
Lee eflfected a slight connection between the two wings of his army, and soon 
afterward, Stuart, at dawn, shouted at the head of the Confederate column on 
Hooker's right, " Charge, and remember Jackson !" whose troops he was lead- 
ing, and fell furiously upon a portion of the line commanded by General 
Sickles. Lee attacked Hooker's left and center again. The struggle was 
severe and sanguinary, and when, toward noon. Sickles, finding himself sorely 
pressed, sent to Hooker for re-enforcements, the chief had just been prostrated 
by an accident, and for a brief space the army was without a head.-* There 
was an injurious delay, and finally, after long and hard fighting, the whole 
National army was pushed from the field, and took a strong position on the 
roads back of Chancellorsville, leading to the Rapid Anna and Rappahannock. 
Lee's army was now united, while Hooker's remained divided. 

Sedgwick had endeavored to obey Hooker's command to join him, but 
failed to do so. He had thrown his army across the river on the morning of 
the 2d [May], and was lying quietly when he received the order at midnight. 
He moved immediately, and took possession of Fr'edericksbui-g. General 

1 Jackson had been reconnoiteriiig in front of his forces, and, when retiring in the darkness, 
he and his companions were mistaken by their friends for Union cavalry, and were fired upon. 
Jackson feU, pierced by their bullets, and some of his staff were killed. His arm was shattered, 
and afterward amputated. He died on the 10th of May. 

' A cannon-ball struck a pillar of the Chancellor House, and hurled it with such force 
against Hooker, that it stunned him. The command then devolved on Couch, but Hooker was 
able to resume it in the course of a few hours. 



1S63.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. g5;l 

Early was then in command on the heights. Sedgwick formed storming col- 
umns in the morning, drove the Confederates from the fortified ridge, and with 
nearly his entire force pushed on toward Chancellorsville, At Salem Churcli, 
a few miles from Fredericksburg, he was met and checked, by a force sent by 
Lee, after a sharp fight, by which he lost, that day, including the struggle for 
the heights in the morning, about five thousand men. Instead of joining- 
Hooker, Sedgwick found himself compelled, the next day, in order to save his 
army, to fly across the Rappahannock, which he did, near Banks's Ford, on the 
night of the 4th and 5th of May. Hooker, meanwhile, had- heard of the 
perilous situation of Sedgwick, and, on consultation with his corps command- 
ers, it Avas determined to retreat to the north side of the river. Lee had pre- 
pared to strike Hooker a heavy blow on the 5tli. A violent rain-storm 
prevented, and that night the Nationals passed the river in safety without 
molestation. On the same day the Confederate army resumed its position on 
the heights at Fredericksburg. Both parties had suffered very severe losses.' 
While Hooker and Lee were contending at Chancellorsville, a gi-eater por- 
tion of the cavalry of the Army of the Potomac, commanded by Stoneman, 




EUINS OF THE CHANCELLOR MANSION. 



were raiding on the communications of the Army of Northern Virginia. 
They crossed the Rappahannock [April 29], and swept down toward Rich- 
mond in the direction of Gordonsville. Unfortunately for the efliciency of 
the expedition, the command was divided, and raided in various directions, 
one party, under Kilpatrick, approaching within two miles of Richmond. They 
destroyed much property, but the chief object of the expedition, namely, the 
breaking up of the railways between Lee and Richmond, was not accomplished, 
and the week's work of the cavalry had very little bearing on the progress of 
the war. 

' The National loss was reported at 17,197, including about 5,000 prisoners. They left 
behind, in their retreat, their dead and wounded, 13 pieces of artillery, about 20,000 small-arms, 
17 colors, and a large quantity of ammunition. Tlie Confederate loss was probably about 15,000, 
•of whom 5,000 were prisoners, with 15 colors, and 7 pieces of artillery. 

* The villa and out-buildings of Mr. Chancellor constituted "Chancellorsville." Tliat man- 
sion was beaten into ruins auring the battle. The picture gives its appearance when the writer 
sketched it, in June, 1866. 



552 "^^^ NATION. [18G3. 

We liave observed ' that Longstreet was operating agaiust General Peek 
in the vicinity of Norfolk. The latter officer, Avith a considerable force, was 
in a strongly fortified position at Suifolk, at the head of the Nansemond River, 
from Avhich he kept watch over Norfolk and the mouth of the James River, 
and furnished a base for operations against Petersburg and the important Wel- 
don railway. Early in April [1863], Longstreet made a sudden and vigorous 
movement against SuflEblk, expecting to drive the Nationals from that post, 
seize Norfolk and Portsmouth, and perhajis make a demonstration against 
Fortress jNIonroe. But Peck met his foe with such skill and valor that 
Longstreet was compelled to resort to a siege. In this he failed, and on 
liearing of the battle at Chancelloi-sville, he withdrew and joined Lee, making 
that commander's army nearly as strong as that of his antagonist. Hooker's 
losses, and the expiration of the terms of his nine months' and two years' 
men, to the number of almost 30,000, about to occur, greatly reduced his num- 
bers. Lee's army Avas buoyant,'^ and Hooker's Avas desponding. 

Impelled by false notions of the temper of the people of the Free-labor 
States, and the real resources and strength of the government, and elated by 
the events at Chancellorsville, the Chief Leader now ordered Lee to invade 
Maryland and Pennsyhania again. Hooker suspected such intention, and so 
reported, but the autliorities at Washington were sIoav to believe that Lee 
would repeat the folly of the previous year. But he did so. By a flank 
movement he caused Hooker to break up his encampment on the Rappahan- 
nock, and move toward Washington, after there had been some sharp cavalry 
engagements near the river, above Fredericksburg. Lee. sent his left wing, 
under EavcII, through Chester Gap of the Blue Ridge, into the Shenandoah 
Valley. He swept down rapidly to Winchester, and drove Milroy [June 15, 
1863], who Avas there with seven thousand men, across the Potomac into Mary- 
land and Pennsylvania, Avitli the loss of nearly all of his artillery and ammu- 
nition. He also lost many men in the race from Winchester to the Potomac, 
but saved his trains. 

Hooker, at the same time, had moved from the Rap])ahannock to Centre- 
ville, for the purpose of covering Washington, Avhile Longstreet marched on a 

1 See page 648. 

" The Confederates and their friends were full of hope at this time. The repulse of the Army 
of tlie Potomac seemed to promise security to Richmond for some time. Vicksburg and Port 
Hudson [see page 646] then seemed impregnable ; and the promises of the disloyal Peace Faction- 
al the North, of a counter-revolution in the Free-labor States, seemed likely to be soon fulfilled. 
The news of the Battle of Chancellorsville inspirited the friends of the Confederates in England, 
and these were clamorous for their government to acknowledge the Confederacy as an inde- 
pendent nation; and in the spring of 1864 a large bodj^, representing the ruling classes in Eng- 
land, formed a league, to assist the Confederates, called the Southern Indqjendence Association. 
But the British government wisely hesitated, and only the Pope of Rome, of all the rulers of the 
earth, ever recognized "President" Davis as the head of a nation. In a friendly letter he 
addressed him as " tlie Illustrious and Honorable Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate 
States of America." At this time a scheme of the French F]niperor for destroying the Republic 
of Mexico and aiding the Confederates, was in operation, 20,000 French troops and 5,000 recreant 
Mexicans being engaged in the work. The Austrian Archduke Maximilian was made Emperor* 
of Mexico by means of French bayonets, but Avhen the Civil War closed, in 1865, and the 
scheming Napoleon saw tliat our Republic was stronger than ever, he abandoned the enterprise 
aud his dupe, and Maximilian, overthrown, was shot by order of the legitimate Republican Chief 
Magistrate of Mexico. 



1863.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



653 



parallel line along the eastern bases of the Blue Ridge, watching for an oppor- 
tunity to pounce upon the National Capital. Cavalry skirmishes often occurred, 
for the hostile forces were continually feeling each other. Meanwhile fifteen 
hundred Confederate cavalry had dashed across the Potomac in pursuit of 
Milroy's wagon-train, swept up the Cumberland Valley to Chambersburg, in 
Pennsylvania, destroyed the railway in that region, and plundered the people. 
This raid produced great alarm. Governor Curtin issued a call for the Penn- 
sylvania militia to turn out in defense of their State, and the National authori- 
ties had taken measures to meet the peril. AYhen, a little later, the Confederate 
army was streaming across the Potomac, about fifty thousand troops, or one 
half the number the President had called for from the States nearest the Capi- 
tal, were under arras. Almost one half of these were from Pennsylvania, and 
fifteen thousand were from New York. The apathy shoAvn by Pennsylvanians 
when danger seemed remote, now disappeared. 

By skillful movements, Lee kept Hooker in doubt as to his real intentions, 
until Ewell's corps had crossed the Potomac at Williamsport and Shepards- 
town [June 22 and 23], and was pressing up the Cumberland Valley. Ewell 
advanced with a ])art of his force to within a few miles of the capital of Penn- 
sylvania, on the Susquehanna, while another portion, under Early, reached 
that river farther down, after passing through Emmettsburg, Gettysburg, and 
York, and levying contributions on the people. These movements created 
an intense panic, and with reason, for at one time it seemed as if there was no 
power at hand to prevent the invaders from marching to the Schuylkill, and 
e\en to tlie Hudson. Three days after Ewell crossed the Potomac, Longstreet 
and Hill followed, and on the 25th of June []8(3;3] the whole of Lee's army 
was again in Maryland and Pennsylvania. 

The Army of the Potomac was thrown across the river at and near 
Edwards's Ferry, one hundred thousand strong, having been re-enforced by 
troops in the vicinity of Washington. 
A diiference of opinion now arose be- 
tAveen Generals Hooker and Halleck 
(the latter then General-in-Chief of the 
armies), concerning the occupation of 
Harper's Ferry. Their views were ir- 
reconcilable, and the former oiFered his 
resignation. It Avas accepted, and Gen- 
eral George G. Meade was placed in 
command of the Army of the Potomac, 
nnd did not relinquish it until the close 
of the war. A change in the com- 
manders of an army in the presence of 
an enemy is a perilous act, but in this 
case no evil followed. General Meade 
assumed the command on the 28th of 
June, when the army was lying at Frederick, 




GEORGE G. MEADE. 



Maryland, 



in a position 



10 dart through the South Mountain Gaps upon Lee's line of communication, 



g54 "I'HE NATION. [1863, 

upon his columns in retreat, or to follow liim on a parallel line toward the 
Susquehanna. 

Lee was about to cross the Susquehanna at Harrisburg, and march on 
Philadelphia, when he was alarmed by information of the position of the Army 
of the Potomac in increased force, wliich was threatening his flank and rear. 
He observed at the same time the rapid gathering of the yeomanry of Penn- 
sylvania, and troops from other States on his front, and he thought it prudent 
to abandon his scheme of further invasion. He immediately recalled Ewell, 
and ordered a concentration of the Army of Northern Virginia in the vicinity 
of Gettysburg, Avith a view of falling upon the Nationals with crushing force, 
and then marching on Baltimore and Washington, or, in the event of defeat, 
to have a direct line of retreat to the Potomac. 

In the mean time Meade had put his army in motion toward the Susque- 
hanna, but it was not until the evening of the 30th of June that he was 
advised of Lee's evident intention to give battle in full force. Satisfied of this,. 
he prepared to meet the shock on a line south of Gettysburg. He had already 
sent his cavalry forward to reconnoiter. At Hanover, east of Gettysburg^ 
Kilpatrick's command encountered [June 29] and defeated, in a sharp fight, 
some of Stuart's cavalry, and on the same day Buford and his horsemen 
entered Gettysburg. The Confederates were not yet there, and on the follow- 
ing day the First Corps, commanded by General J. F. Reynolds, reached that 
place. General Hill was then approaching from Chambersburg, and that night 
Buford lay between the Confederates and Gettysburg. On the following 
morning [July 1] he met the van of the Confederates. A hot skirmish ensued. 
Reynolds hastened forward to the scene of action, and on Oak or Seminary 
Ridge a severe battle was fought, in Avhich Reynolds was killed. Meanwhile 
the Eleventh (Howard's) Corps came up, and the conflict assumed grander 
proportions, for Lee's troops were concentrating there. The Nationals were 
finally pressed back, and under the direction of Howard took an advantageous 
position on a range of rocky heights back of but close to Gettysburg, forming 
two sides of a triangle, whereof Cemetery Hill, nearest the town, was the 
apex. There the Nationals bivouacked that night, and Meade and the 
remainder of the troops hastened to join them. Lee's army occupied Seminary 
Ridge that night. 

Both commanders were averse to taking the initiative of battle, and it was 
between three and four o'clock in the afternoon of the 2d before the struggle 
Avas renewed. Then Lee fell heavily upon Meade's left, commanded by Sickles. 
A sanguinary contest ensued, which gradually extended to the center, where 
Hancock was in command. The chief struggle was for a rocky eminence, 
called Round Top Ridge, or Little Round Top ; but the Nationals firmly held 
it against fierce assaults. Heavy masses were thrown against Hancock, but 
these w^ere cast back with heavy losses ; and, at sunset, the battle ended on 
the left and center of the Nationals. When the sounds of conflict died away 
on that part of the field, they were heard on the right and right center, where 
Slocum and Howard were in command. Howard was on Cemetery Hill, and 
Slocum on Gulp's Hill. Against these Early and Johnson, of Ewell's corps, 



1863.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



655 



advanced with great vigor. They were thrown back from Cemetery Hill, but 
succeeded in penetrating, and holding for the night, the Avorks on the extreme 
right of Slocum's command. It Avas near ten o'clock at night [July 2, 1863] 
when the battle ended, and the advantage seemed to be with the Confederates. 

Both parties now prepared for another struggle the next day. It was 
begun at four o'clock in the morning [July 3], when Slocum drove the Con- 
federates out of his lines, and some distance back. It required a hard fight for 
four hours to accomplish it, but it was done. Then Ewell was firmly held in 
check. Round Top Ridge, on Meade's extreme left, was impregnable, and so 
Lee determined to assail his more vulnei-able center. He spent the whole fore- 
noon in preparations for an attack, and, at one o'clock, he opened upon Cem- 
etery Hill and its immediate vicinity one hundred and forty-five cannon. A 
hundred National guns quickly responded, and for the space of two hours 
Gettysburg and the surrounding country were made to tremble by the thunder 
of more than two hundred cannon. Then, like a stream of lava, the Confed- 
erates, preceded by a cloud of skirmishers, swept over the plain, and assailed 
the National line. Fearful was the struggle, and fearful the loss. At near 
sunset the assailants were repulsed at every point, and the great and decisive 
Battle of Gettysburg was won by the Array of the Potomac. It had been 
fought with amazing courage and fortitude by both ai'mies, and each was 
dreadfully shattered by the collision,' The writer was upon the ground a few 
days after the battle, 
when full two hundred 
dead horses were still 
unburied. The annexed 
picture shows a group of 
them as they fell in the 
road in front of a farm- 
house, near General 
Meade's head-quarters. 

On the evening of the 
day after the battle [July 
4, 1863], Lee began are- 
treat to^Tard Virginia, 
and, the next day, was 
followed by Meade, who 
chased him to the Potomac, at Williamsport, above Harper's Ferry. There, by 
strong intrenchments and a show of force, Lee kept Meade at bay until he could 
construct pontoon bridges, Avhen, over these, and by fording the river above, the 
whole remnant of his army, his artillery and trains, passed into Virginia, and 
escaped, much to the disappointment of the loyal people. When it was known 
that the Confederates had been beaten at Gettysburg, and were in full retreat. 




SCENE ON THE GETTYSBURG BATTLE-GROUND. 



' The National loss during the three days of conflict was 23,186 men, of whom 2,834 were 
killed, 13,709 wounded, and 6.643 were missing. Leo, as u-sual, made no report of his losses. 
He spoke of them as having been " severe." A careful estimate, made from various statementa. 
places it at about 30,000, of whom 14,000 were prisoners. 



^56 '^^^^ NATION. [1863. 

it was expected they would be captured at the margin of the swollen Potomac. 
But that disappointment speedily gave Avay to a feeling of satisfaction because 
of the important victory. That battle proved to be the pivotal one of the 
war — the turning point in the rebellion. The scale of success Avas then turned 
in favor of the National cause. It was so regarded at the time, and in view of 
the importance of the victory, the President, as the representative of the 
nation, recommended the observance of a day [Aug. 15] "for National thanks- 
giving, praise, and prayer." ' 

While the loyal people were rejoicing because of the great deliverance at 
Gettysburg, and the government was preparing for a final and decisive 
struggle with its foes, leading politicians of the Peace Faction, evidently in 
afiiliation with the disloyal secret organization, known as Knights of tlie 
Golden CitcU^ were using every means in their power to defeat the patriotic 
purposes of the Administration, and to stir up the people of the Free-labor 
States to a counter-revolution. This had been their course for several months 
during the dark hours of the Republic, before the dawn at Gettysburg ; and 
the more strenuous appeared the efforts of the government to suppress the 
rebellion, more intense was their zeal in opposing it. This opposition was 
specially active, when the President, according to the authority of Congress, 
found it necessary, in consequence of the great discouragements to volunteering 
produced by the Peace Faction, to order [May 8, 1863] a draft or conscription 
to be made, to fill up the ranks of the army. This measure, the suspension of 
the privilege of the writ of Habeas Corjms, and arbitrary arrests, were severely 
denounced. These, and the arrest and j^unishment, for treasonable practices, 
of C. L. Vallandigham, a citizen of Ohio and late member of Congi*ess, one of the 



' The Secretary of State, satisfied that the rebellion would soon be ended, addressed [August 
12, 1863] a cheering circular to the diplomatic agents of the government abroad, in which he 
recited the most important events in the history of the war thus far, and declared that the countr}^ 
•'showed no signs of exhaustion of money, men, or materials;" and mentioned the fact that our 
loan was purchased, at par, by our citizens at the average of §1,200,000 daily, and that gold was 
selling in our market at 23 and 28 per cent, premium, "while in tlie insurrectionary region it 
•commanded 1,200 per cent, premium." According to the report of the Confederate "Secretary 
of the Treasury," at that time, the Confederate debt was over $600,000,000. At about the same 
time "President" Davis sent forth an address, for the purpose of "firing the Southern 
heart," and reconciling the people^to the merciless conscription they were then subjected to, filled 
with the most flagrant misrepresentations. He told them, in effect, that the Northern people 
were little better than savages. " Their malignant rage," he said, "aims at nothing less than the 
extermination of yourselves, your wives, and your children. They seek to destroy what thc}^ 
cannot plunder. They propose as spoils of victory that your homes shall be partitioned among 
wretches whose atrocious cruelty has stamped infamy on their government. They design to 
incite servile insurrection, and light the fires of incendiarism whenever they can reach your 
homes ; and they debauch an inferior race, heretofore docile and contented, by promising them 
the indulgence of the vilest passions as the price of their treachery." 

Davis was th^n exasperated by the failure of an attempt of his to gain an official recognition 
by the government, by means of a trick. He sent his lieutenant, Alexander H. Stephens, under 
a. false pretense, at the moment when Lee, as he thought, was marching triumphantly on Phila- 
delphia, to seek an interview with the President, as the representative of the "government," so- 
called, at Richmond. ' Stephens went to Fortress Monroe, but was not permitted to go farther. 
His mission to Wasliington doubtless had a twofold object, namely, an official recognition of the 
Confederacy by the act of treating with it, and for the purpose of proclaiming the " Confederate 
government," with Jefferson Davis as Dictator, from the portico of the Capitol, when Lee should 
seize "Washington, as it was confidently believed he was about to do. 

^ See page 520. 



1863.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



657 






most conspicuous leaders of the Peace Faction,' furnished that active fragment 
of the Democratic party* with pretenses for the most bitter denunciations 
of the government, and violent opposition to its measures. 

The inflammatory appeals of politicians excited the passions of the more 
■dangerous classes in cities, and finally led to a fearful riot in the city of New- 
York, at the middle of July, the immediate pretext being opposition to the 
Draft, which commenced there 
on Monday, the 13th. A mob 
suddenly collected, destroyed 
the apparatus for making the 
Draft, and burned the build- 
ing. Like a plague this pub- 
lic disorder seemed to break 
out simultaneously at different 
points in the northern part of 
the city, and for three days 
the commercial metropolis 
was at the mercy of lawless 
men and women, chiefly na- 
tives of Ireland of the lower 
class, and disloyal men from Slave-labor States, 
soon ceased, and was followed with that of, " Down with the Abolitionists ! 
Down with the Nigger ! Hurrah for Jeff. Davis !" Arson and plunder 
became the business of the rioters, and maiming and murder was their recrea- 
tion. The colored population of the city were special objects of their wrath. 
These were hunted down, bruised, and killed, as if they had been noxious wild 
beasts. Men, Avomen, and children shared a common fate. An asylum for 
colored children Avas sacked and burned, while the poor, affrighted orphans, 
some beaten and maimed, fled in terror to Avhatever shelter they could find. 
Finally, the police, aided by some troops, quelled the riot with the strong arm 
of power, after a sacrifice of full four hundred human lives, and the destruction 
of property valued at $2,000,000. After that, the Draft was resumed, and 
went quietly on.^ 




The cry against the Draft 



^ General Burnside, in command of the Department of the Ohio, issued an order for the sup- 
pression of sedition and treasonable speech and conduct. Vallandigham, whose sympathy with 
the cause of the Confederates had been conspicuously shown from the beginning, denounced thus 
order, and openly violated it. He was arrested, tried by a military commission, found guilty, and, 
by orders of the President, was sent within the Confederation, with a penalty of imprisonment 
should he return. He was treated with contempt by his "Southern friends," and soon made hia 
way in a blockade-runner to Halifax, and thence into Canada. 

'^ The Peace Faction of the "Democratic" or Opposition party did not fairly represent the 
great mass of the members of that party. It was essentially disloyal : they were loyal. Yet 
the influence of that faction was so potent, that it controlled the policy of the party as an organi- 
zation. Its aims appeared no higher than the control of the emoluments and oflBces of the gov- 
ernment ; and the encouragement it continually held out to the Conspirators, by falsely repre- 
senting the Opposition party as friendly to their cause, and discouraging volunteering and other 
efforts for putting down the rebellion, prolonged the war at least two years, and, as a consequence, 
tens of thousands of precious lives, and tens of millions of treasure, were wasted. 

' Horatio Seymour, who was one of the ablest of the leaders of the Peace Faction, and then 
Oovernor of the State of New York, had denounced the government aa a despot, because of the 



g58 ^2^ NATION. [1863L 

There appears to be ample evidence tliat preparations liad been made 
among the disloyal politicians of, the Free-labor States, at the time we are con- 
sidering, for a counter-revolution, which should compel the government to 
make terms of peace with the Confederates, on the basis of a dissolution of the 
Union and the independence of the so-called Confederate States. The invasion 
of Maryland and Pennsylvania, so as to encourage the Peace Faction, was a 
part of the drama;' and chiefly for the encouragement of the same class irj 
the Western States, and to form a nucleus for armed opponents of the govern- 
ment in that region, the notorious guerrilla chief, John H. Morgan, was sent 
into Indiana and Ohio at the close of June, with over three thousand mounted 
men. He crossed the Ohio River from Kentucky into Indiana, some distance 
below Louisville, and, pushing a little into the interior, made a plundering 
raid eastward through that State and Ohio, well toward the Pennsylvania 
border. There was an uprising of the people because of his presence, but not 
such a one as the Peace Faction had led him to expect. Within forty-eight 
hours after Morgan entered Indiana, sixty thousand of its citizens had re- 
sponded to the call of the Governor to turn out and drive him out of it. 
Equally patriotic were the people of Ohio. Morgan was pursued, and 
finally captured, with a remnant of his band, nearly all of whom were killed 
or made prisoners. The truth seemed to be that the reverse of Lee at Gettys- 
burg had disconcerted the leaders of the Peace Faction, and they were com- 
pelled, by prudence, to postpone their revolutionary operations. The riot in 
New York seems to have been an irregular manifestation of an organized out- 
break in that city, when, as it was expected, the neighing of the horses of Lee's 
cavalry would be heard on the opposite banks of the Hudson. 

When Lee escaped into Virginia [July 14, 1863], and moved up the Shen- 
andoah Valley, Meade determined to follow him along the route pursued by 

arrest and punishment of Vallandigham, "not," he said, "for an offense against law, but for a 
disregard of an invalid order, put forth in an utter disregard of the principles of civil liberty." 
He opposed the Draft; mildly and without effect he interposed his authority as Governor to quell 
the riot, and sent his adjutant-general to Washin2:ton to demand the suspension of the Draft. 
This he told the mob, and said : " Wait till my adjutant returns from Washington, and you shall 
be satisfied." He wanted the Draft postponed until the courts should decide whether it was con- 
stitutional, but this obvious advantage to the Confederates, who were then filling their ranks by a 
rigorous conscription, the President refused to give, and the Draft went on. 

' Lee's invasion was counted on largely as an aid to the Peace Faction in carrying out their 
plans. And aftef his failure, and he was lying quietly near the Rapid Anna^ in September, the 
Richmond Enquirer said : " The success of the Democratic party [at the approaching election] 
Avould be no longer doubtful, should General Lee once more advance on Meade. . . . He 
may so move and direct his arlny as to produce political results, which, in their bearing upon this 
war, will prove more effectual than the bloodiest victories. Let him drive Meade into Washing- 
ton, and he will again raise the spirits of the Democrats, confirm their timid, and give confidence 
to their wavering. He will embolden the Peace party should he again cross the Potomac, 
for he will show the people of Pennsylvania how little security they have from Lincoln for the 
protection of their homes." 

Matthew F. Maury, formerly Superintendent of the National Observatory, and one of the 
most active enemies to his country, said, in a letter to the London Times, on the nth of 
August, 1863: "There is already a Peace party in the North. All the embarrassments with 
which that party can surround Mr. Lincoln, and all the difficulties that it can throw in the way 
of the War party in the North, operate directly as so much aid and comfort to the South. . . . 
New York is becoming the champion of State Rights in the North, and to that extent is taking 
Southern ground. . . . Yallaudigham waits and watches over the border, pledged, if elected 
GrOTemor of Ohio, to array it against Lincoln and the war, and go for peace." 



J863.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. g5gA 

McClellan in his race for the Rappahannock with the same foe the year before,' 
keeping close to the eastern slopes of the Blue Ridge, and using its gaps as circum- 
stances might dictate. The Army of the Potomac crossed the river on the 1 7th 
and 18th of July, and moved rapidly forward, getting the start of its antagonist^ 
which had lingered between the Potomac and Winchester. Lee tried to recall 
Meade, by threatening another invasion of Maryland. He failed, and then 
marched rapidly up the Shenandoah Valley to meet the dangers that threatened 
his front and flank. There were skirmishes in the mountain-passes during this 
exciting race, one of which, at Manassas Gap, so detained Meade's army, that . 
Lee, by a quick movement, went through Chester Gap, and took position in. 
front of the Nationals, between the Rappahannock and Rapid Anna rivers.. 
Meade slowly advanced to the Rappahannock, and then the two armies rested 
for some time. Both were somewhat weakened by drafts upon them for men 
to serve elsewhere. Finally, at the middle of September, Meade crossed the 
i"iver and drove Lee beyond the Rapid Anna, where the latter took a strongly 
defensive position. In the mean time Meade's cavalry had not been idle, and 
divisions under Buford and Kilpatrick had considerable skirmishing with those 
of Stuart between the two rivers. 

General Meade contemplated a forward movement for some time, and Lee,,, 
feeling able to cope with his antagonist, proposed to march directly on Wash- 
ington, at the risk of losing Richmond, but he was overruled by his "govern- 
ment." So he proceeded to employ the more cautious measure of turning- 
Meade's right flank, and attempting to get in his rear and seize the National 
Capital. He had moved some distance for this purpose, and was on Meade's 
flank before the latter was aware of it. Then a close race in the direction of 
Washington, by the two armies, occurred for the third time. The Army of 
the Potomac was the winner, and reached the heights at Centreville, the first . 
objective [October 15, 1863], before its antagonist. There had been some^ 
severe collisions on the way. Gregg's cavalry Avas routed, with a loss of five 
hundred men, at JeiFersonton. Stuart, with about two thousand men, hung 
closely upon the rear flank of Meade's army, and at Auburn he came near 
being captured, with all his men. He escaped, however ; and from that point 
to Bristow Station there was a sharp race. There a battle occurred between 
ihe corps of Generals Warren and Hill, in which the pursuing Confederates 
were repulsed, and the Union force moved on and joined the main army, thenr. 
at Centreville. At Bristow Station Lee gave up the ^^e, and fell back to the-i 
Rappahannock, destroying the Orange and Alexandria railway behind him,. 
Meade slowly followed, after the railway was repaired, attacked the Confed- 
erates at Rappahannock Station, on the river, and, after a severe battle, drove 
them toward Culpepper Court-House. 

Lee now took post again behind the Rapid Anna, and Meade's army- 
lay quietly between the two rivers until late in November, while he was 
watching for a favorable opportunity to advance on his foe, whose forces,, 
he had observed, were spread over a considerable surface, in the directioit 

' See page 631. 



1560 



T H K NATION. 



[1863. 



of Gordonsville. But Lee had begun the construction of strong defenses along 
the line of Mine Run, and Meade determined to advance and attempt to turn 
his position. It Avould be a perilous undertaking at that season of the year, 
for it involved the necessity of cutting loose from his supplies, M'hich could not 
be carried with safety to the south side of the Rapid Anna. The risk was 
taken. The troops were provided with ten days' rations, and, crossing the 
river on the 26th [November, 1863], pushed on in the direction of Mine Run^ 
along the line of which were strong intrenchments, defended by heavy abatis 




CJeneral Warren, in the advance, opened a battle, but it was soon found that 
the Confederates were too strongly intrenched to promise a successful assault. 
So Meade suspended the attack, withdrew, and established his army in winter 
quarters on the north side of the Rapid Anna. So ended the campaign of the 
Army of the Potomac in 1863, 

In Western Virginia, adjoining the great theater on which the armies of 
the Potomac and of Northern Virginia were performing, there had been very 
few military movements of importance since the close of 1861. In the summer 
of 1863 a raiding parMkunder Colonel Tolland, went over the mountains from 
the Kanawha Valley, and struck the Virginia and Tennessee railway at 
Wytheville. Finding sharp resistance, they retraced their steps with great 
sufifering. A little later. General W. W. Averill went over the mountain- 
ranges from Tygart's Valley, with a strong cavalry force, destroyed Confed- 
erate salt-works and other property, and menaced Staunton. He fought Con- 
federate cavalry near White Sulphur Springs for nearly two days [August 26 
and 27], and Avas compelled to retreat. Early in November he started on 



' Abatis is a French term in Fortification, for obstructions placed in front of works, composed 
of felled trees, with their branches pointing outward. Such obstruction is represented in the 
engraving. 



1863.] LINCOLN'S A D M IN I STR A T 1 X. QQ1 

another exi^edition, pusliiiiix the Confederates before liim in the niountahi 
regions, and nearly purging AVest Virginia of armed rebels. He pushed for- 
ward for the purpose of breaking up the Virginia and Tennessee railway^ 
which was the chief communication between the armies of Lee and Bragg^ 
and on the 16th of December, after a perilous march, over icy roads, he struck 
that highway at Salem, and destroyed the track and other property over ai» 
extent of about fifteen miles. The Confederates in all that region wei-e 
aroused, and no less than seven diflerent leaders combined in an attempt 
to intercept Averill's return, but failed. The raider escaped, with two hun- 
dred prisoners, and a loss of only six men drowned, five wounded, and ninety- 
missing. 

Let lis now turn our attention to events in Tennessee, Avhere we left the large 
armies of Rosecrans and Bragg, after the Battle of Stone's River, the former 
at Murfreesboro' and the latter a little further southward.' Bragg' s line was 
along the general direction of the Duck River, from near the Cumberland 
mountains westward,'^ and in that relative position the two armies lay front 
January until June [1863], Rosecrans waiting to complete full preparations for 
an advance, before moving. Meanwhile, detachments of the two armies, chiefly 
of mounted men, were active in minor operations. At the beginning of Feb- 
ruary, General Wheeler, Bragg's chief of cavalry, Avith Wharton and Forrest 
as brigadiers, concentrated his forces, over four thousand strong, at Franklin, 
a little south of Nashville, and, advancing rapidly to the Cumberland River, 
attempted to capture the post of Fort Donelson,^ then commanded by Colonel 
Harding. They were repulsed, after considerable loss on both sides. Genei-al 
J. C. Davis was operating in Wheeler's rear, and hastened his dej^arture from 
the region of the Cumberland. A little later. General Earl Van Dorn was-, 
found hovering around Franklin with a considerable force of cavalry audi 
infantry, and against these General Sheridan and Colonel Colburn were sent.. 
The latter was compelled to surrender [March 5] to superior numbers, whiles 
the former drove Vau Dorn southward across the Duck River. 

There was a severe struggle eastward of Murfreesboro' [March 1 8] between- 
troops under Colonel Hall and those of Morgan, the guei-rilla chief, in which 
the latter were worsted, and lost between three and four hundred men. 
Early in April Van Dorn was again in the vicinity of Franklin, with a force- 
estimate^ at nine thousand men, the object being to seize that post, pi-eliminary 
to an attack on Nashville, the great depository of Rosecrans's supplies. Gen- 
eral Gordon Granger was then in command at Franklin, where he Avas building-; 
a fort on the bank of the Harpeth River, and, being forewarned, he was pre- 
pared for an attack, which Van Dorn made on the 10th [April, 1863]. Tlicr 
Confederates were repulsed and retired to Spring Hill, after a loss of about 

' See page 639. 

' Bragg's line extended from Columbia, on the west, to McMinnville, on the east. His infantrr 
occupied the space between Wartrace and Shelbyville ; his cavalry, on his right, stretched out to 
McMinnville, and on his left as far as Spring Hill, between Franklin and Columbia. 

* Forrest had been operating at one or two other points on the Cumberland, for the purpose 
of cutting off Rosecrans's supplies by way of that river, for his army was chiefly subsisted by 
provisions that came down from the region of the Ohio River. 



€62 



THE NATION. 



[18G3. 



three hundred men. The Union loss was less than forty.' A few days later 
^-detachment of Rosecrans's army, under General J. J. Reynolds, drove a band 
of Morgan's men from McMinnville [April 20], and destroyed a good deal of 
donfederate property there ; and these and lesser expeditions, sent out from 
riime to time, while Rosecrans was procuring cavalry horses and making other 
preparations for an advance, caused great circumspection on the part of the 
Confederates, 

A more ambitious expedition than any previously sent out by Rosecrans, 
■moved toward the middle of April, under Colonel A. D. Streight, for the pur- 
pose of crippling the resources of the foe. He left Nashville in steamers [April 
11], and, debarking at Fort Donelson, crossed over to the Tennessee River at 
Fort Henry, and ascended that stream to the borders of Mississipi^i and Ala- 
•bama, gathering horses for his use on the way. At Tuscumbia, most of his 
".troops being then mounted, Streight turned southward, and, sweeping through 
Alabama in a curve bending eastward, pushed on toward Rome, in Northern 
'•'Georgia, where extensive iron-works were in operation, and Atlanta, an import- 
:4nt railway center. The cavalry of Forrest and Roddy followed. The 
;parties skirmished and raced; and finally, when near Rome, Streight's 
caxhausted command was struck and mostly captured [May 3, 1863], when 




LIBBY PRISON, KICHMOND. 



they were sent to Richmond, and confined in the famous Libby Prison. From 
ith2,t loathsome place the leader and one hundred of his officers escaped, in 
^i^^ebruary following, by burrowing under the foundations of the building. 

As June wore away, and the Army of the Cumberland (Rosecrans's) was 

' Van Dora was one of the most dashing of the Confederate leaders. , He was shot soon after 
Ti,he battle we have just considered, by an indignant husband, whose wife the Confederate leader 
:liad dishonored. 



1863.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. gg3 

yet lying at Murfreesboro', the public, unable to comprehend the obstacle to 
its advance, became impatient of the delay. The cavalry of that army was 
then in a fair condition, and its supplies being abundant, Rosecrans, on the 
23d of June, ordered an advance, his grand objective being Chattanooga 
Bragg, his antagonist, was strongly intrenched among hills favorable for 
defensive operations. Yet the Army of the Cumberland, moving in three 
corps, commanded respectively by Generals Thomas, McCook, and Crittenden, 
was so skillfully managed, that the Confederates were soon pushed from their 
position along the line of the Duck River, back to Tullahoma. When Bragg 
saw Rosecrans seize the mountain passes on his front, and threaten his flanks 
in hi* new jjosition, he fled [June 30, 1863] without offering to give a blow in 
defense of a line of most formidable works which he had cast up in the course 
of several months. 

Rosecrans now pressed hard upon the rear of the fugitive Confederates, 
but the latter having the railway for transportation, kept out of his reach, and 
pushed as rapidly as possible over the Cumbei-land Mountains toward the Ten- 
nessee River, which they crossed at Bridgeport, destroyed the bridge behind 
them, and hastened to Chattanooga.' Rosecrans advanced his army to the 
base of the mountains, when, finding Bragg too far ahead to be easily over- 
taken, he halted his entire force, arjd rested more than a month while gathering 
supplies for his army at proper places,* and repairing the railway from the 
high table-land at Decherd, down through the mountain pass of Big Crow 
Creek, to Stevenson. At the middle of August he moved forward, his army 
stretched over a long line east and west, with cavalry on its flanks. In the 
course of four or five days it crossed the mountain ranges and stood along the 
shores of the Tennessee from above Chattanooga westward for a hundred 
miles, startling [August 21, 1863] Bi-agg by its apparition, the thunder of can- 
non on the eminences opposite that town, and the screaming of shells over the 
Confederate camp. 

Early in September, Thomas and McCook crossed the Tennessee with theil" 
•corps at points each side of Bridgeport, where the railway spans it, and by 
the 8th had secured the passes of Lookout Mountain as far as Valley Head, 
while Crittenden's corps took post at Wauhatchie, in Lookout Valley, nearer 
the river. Informed of these threatening movements, Bragg abandoned Chat- 
tanooga, passed through the gaps of the Missionaries' Ridge ^ to the West 
Chickamauga River, in Northern Georgia, and posted his army in a strong 
position near Lafayette, to meet the National forces expected to press through 

• This expulsion of Bragg's armj from Middle Tennessee, by which a greater portion of that 
State and Kentucky was left under the absolute control of the National authority, was a dis- 
heartening event for the Confederates, and they now felt that every thing depended upon their 
holding Chattanooga, the key of East Tennessee, and, indeed, of all Northern Georgia. 

" Bragg had stripped that mountain region of forage, so Rosecrans waited until the Indian 
corn, in cultivated spots, was sufficiently grown to furnish a supply. Meanwhile he gathered 
supplies at Tracy City and Stevenson, and thoroughly picketed the railway from Cowan to 
Bridgeport. 

' The writer was informed by the late John Ross, the venerable Chief of the Cherokee 
Nation, that this undulating ridge, lying back of Chattanooga and rising about 300 feet above the 
Tennessee River, was named the Missionaries' Ridge because missionaries among the Cherokees 
had a station on the southeastern slope of it. 



664 



THE NATION 



[1863. 



the mountain passes. This was done in expectation of precisely what Rose- 
crans proceeded to do, namely, pass through the mountains, and threaten his 
enemy's communications between Dalton and Resaca. Rosecrans came to this 
determination with the mistaken idea, when informed by Crittenden that 
Bragg had left Chattanooga, that the latter had commenced a retreat toward 
Rome. Crittenden, wdio had made a reconnoissance on Lookout Mountain^ 
and from its lofty summit looked down upon Chattanooga and observed that 
Brago- had retreated from it, immediately moved his corps into the Chatta- 
nooga Valley, and on the evening of the 10th of September, encamped at 
Rossville, Avithin three or four miles of the deserted village. Thus, Avithout a 
battle, the chief object of the movement of the Army of the Cumberland 
over the mountains Avas gained. With great ease Bragg had been expelled 
from Middle Tennessee, and was now held at bay in an imfortified position, 
aAvay from the coveted stronghold and strategic position of Chattanooga. 

General Burnside, Avho Avas in command of the Army of the Ohio, Avas 
now brou"-ht into active co-operation Avith Rosecrans, having been ordered to 
pass over the mountains into East Tennessee to assist that leader in his struggle 
with Bragg. When summoned to that field, he concentrated his command, 
then in hand, about tAventy thousand in number, at Crab Orchard, in South- 
eastern Kentucky. He prepared for a rapid movement. His infantry Avere 

mostly mounted ; his cavalry and artil- 
_^ l:;f% lery had good horses, and his supplies 

N were carried on pack-mules, that more 

^i facile movements might be made than a 

wagon-train Avould alloAA^ On the day 
Avhen Bragg Avas startled by the great 
guns of his pursuer at Chattanooga 
) [August 21, 1863], Burnside began his 
march over the Cumbei'land mountains, 
a cavalry brigade in advance. They 
soon passed the great ranges, and Avere 
speedily posted on the line of the rail- 
Avay southwesterly from Loudon, on the 
PACK-MULES. Tennessee River, so as to connect Avith 

Rosecrans at Chattanooga. General 
Buckner, Avho commanded about twenty thousand troops in East Tennessee, 
had retired on Burnside's approach, and joined Bragg, and the important moun- 
tain pass of Cumberland Gap Avas soon in possession of the Nationals. The 
great valley between the Alleghany and Cumberland mountains, from Cleve- 
land to Bristol, seemed to be permanently rid of armed Confederates.' 




' The maguificent Valley of East Tennessee has an average width of seventy-five miles, and 
a length of two hundred miles. The loyal inhabitants of that region received the National 
troops with open arms. It is difficult to conceive the intensity of the feelings of the Union peo- 
ple along tlie line of Burnside's march. "Everywhere," wrote an eye-witness, "the people 
flocked to the roadsides, and, with cheers and wildest demonstrations of welcome, saluted tho 
flag of the Republic and the men who had borne it in triumph to the very heart of the ' Confed- 
eracy.' Old men wept at the sight, wluch they had waited for through months, of sufferings 



1863.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION, 



665 



Believing, as we liaA'e observed, that Bragg had begun a retreat toward 
Rome, Rosecrans pushed his troops through the gaps of Lookout Mountain to 
strike his flank, but he soon ascertained that his foe, instead of retreating, was 
concentrating his forces at Lafayette, to attack the now attenuated line of the 
Army of the Cumberland, whose left was at Ringgold and its right near Alpine 
— points, by the National line, about fifty miles apart. Rosecrans immediately 
ordered the concentration of his own troops, to avoid and meet perils that 
threatened them. This was quickly done, and at a little past the middle of 
September [1863], the contending forces confronted each other, in battle array, 
on each side of the Chickaraauga Creek, in the vicinity of Crawfish " Spring 
and Lee and Gordon's Mill, the line of each stretching northward to the slopes 
of the Missionaries' Ridge. 

General Thomas took position on the extreme National left, and opened 
battle on the morning of the 19th [September], by attacking the Confederate 
right. The conflict raged almost without intermission until four o'clock in the 
afternoon, when there was a lull. It was renewed by the Confederates at five 
o'clock, and continued until dark. On the right center there had been some 
severe fighting, and when night fell the advantage appeared to be with the 
Nationals. In the mean time Long- 
street, who had been sent from Vii*- 
ginia, by Lee, with his corps, to help 
Bragg, and had passed through the 
Carolinas and Georgia to Atlanta, was 
now coming up with his forces. He 
arrived on the field that night, and 
assumed command of Bragg's left, and 
on the morning of the 20th the Con- 
federates had full seventy thousand 
men opposed to fifty-five thousand 
Nationals. 

Both parties prepared to renew 
the struggle in the morning, Thomas's 
troops intrenched during the night. 
A heavy fog enveloped the armies in 

the morning, and when it lifted, between eight and nine o'clock, a most san- 
guinary battle was commenced on the wing where Thomas was in command. 
It soon raged furiously along the whole line. Finally a desperate charge was 
made upon the temporarily AVeakened right center of the Nationals, when the 
line was broken. The right wing was shattered into fragments, and fled in 
disorder toward Rossville and Chattanooga, carrying along upon its turbulent 
and resistless tide Rosecrans, Crittenden, and McCook, while Sheridan and 

children, even, hailed with joy the sign of deliverance. Nobly have these persecuted people 
stood by their faith, and all loyal men will rejoice with them in their rescue at last from tho clutch 
of the destroyer." "They were so glad to see Union soldiers," wrote another, '-that they cooked 
every thing they had, and gave it freely, not asking pay, and apparently not thinking of it. Women 
Btood by the roadside with pails of water, and displayed Union flags. The wonder was wher» 
all the 'Stary and Stripes' caii':' from.'' 




GEORGE H. THOMAS. 



^QQ THE NATION. [1863. 

Davis rallied a portion of it upon another road. Rosecrans, unable to join 
Thomas, and believing the whole army would be speedily hurrying, ijell-raell, 
toward Chattanooga, pushed on to that place to make provision for holding 
it, if possible. But Thomas stood firm, and for awhile fought a greater part 
of the Confederate army, enduring shock after shock, and keeping it at bay 
until he could withdraw his forces, in obedience to an order from Rosecrans. 
This was done in good order, and the worn and wearied troops took position in 
the Rossville and Dry Valley gaps of the Missionaries' Ridge, where they 
bivouacked that night. On the following evening the whole army fell back to 
Chattanooga ; and within forty-eight hours after the battle it was so strongly 
intrenched that it defied Bragg, who had not thought it prudent to follow the 
retreating forces from the battle-field. He contented himself with taking pos- 
session of the Missionaries' Ridge and Lookout Mountain. Victory was won 
by the Confederates in the battle of Chickamauga, but at a fearful cost to both 
armies.' 

The Army of the Cumberland was now closely imprisoned at Chattanooga. 
By holding Lookout Mountain, which abuts upon the Tennessee River, Bragg 
commanded that stream and cut ofi* Rosecrans's communication with his sup- 
plies at Bridgeport and Stevenson, and compelled hihi to transport them in 
wagons, over the rough mountains, fifty or sixty miles. This was a severe and 
precarious service. For awhile the army was on short allowance, and not less 
than ten thousand horses and mules were worked or starved to death in the 
service. In the mean time a change in the organization of the army was 
effected. It was determined by the government to hold Chattanooga, and for 
that purpose it was ordered that the armies under Burnside, Rosecrans, and 
Grant, should be concentrated there. Over these combined forces Grant was 
placed. His field of command was called the Military Division of the Missis- 
sippi.* 

When Grant arrived at Chattanooga, late in October, he found Thomas 
alive to the importance of securing a safe and speedy way for supplies to reach 
that post. Nearly the whole of Bragg's cavalry had been operating against 

1 The National loss was reported at 16,326, of whom 1,687 were killed. The total loss of 
ofiBeers was 974. It is probable the entire Union loss was 19,000. The Confederate loss was 
20,950, of whom 2,674 were killed. Rosecrans brought off from the field 2,003 prisoners, 36 
guns, 20 caissons, and 8,^50 small-arms. 

* Rosecrans was relieved of the command of the Army of the Cumberland, and was succeeded 
by Thomas, and General W. T. Sherman was promoted to the command of Grant's Army of the 
Tennessee. Rosecrans was ordered to St. Louis, and was placed in command of the Department 
of Missouri. 

Before Grant was called to his enlarged command, he had taken measures for securing every 
advantage of the victories at Vicksburg and Port Hudson. He sent his paroled prisoners (see 
page 646) to the Confederate lines at Jackson, and on the same day ordered Sherman to lead a 
heavy force against Johnston, whose troops were hovering in the rear of Vicksburg. His head- 
quarters was at Jackson, and when Sherman advanced, he concentrated his forces there, behind 
intrenchments. From there he was driven on the 13th of July, when he fled toward the interior 
of Mississippi. Grant cast up a line of fortifications around Vicksburg, and Avith these, and the 
expulsion of Johnston, that post was made secure. On the day of the fall of Vicksburg, the 
important post of Helena, in Arkansas, farther up the Mississippi, was attacked by a heavy force 
of Confederates, but they were repulsed with heavy loss ; and when Grant was summoned to the 
-command at Chattanooga, the freedom of navigation on the Mississippi River seemed to be per- 
manently secured. 



J«63.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



667 



his line of communications among tlie mountains. They had seized and 
<lestroyed wagon-trains, and, notwithstanding they were driven here and there 
hy Union cavahy, these raiders made the safe transportation of supplies so 
doubtful, that the troops at Chattanooga Avere threatened with famine. Thomas 
liad already devised a method of relief General Hooker had been sent with 
the Eleventh and Twelfth Corps (How-ard's and Slocum's), from the Army of 
the Potomac, to guard Rosecrans's communications. He was now at Bridge- 
port with a part of these forces, and it was proposed that he should cross the 
Tennessee with them, and, pushing into Lookout Valley, threaten Bragg's 
left, and cover the river to a point where a short route by land to Chattanooga 
might be obtained. Grant approved the plan, and it was executed. Hooker 
reached Wauhatchie, in Lookout Valley, after some fighting, on the 28th of 
October, and at the same time General W. F. Smith came down from Chatta- 
nooga, and threw a pontoon bridge across the river at a point only a few miles 
from that town.' This movement, a Richmond journal said, deprived the 
Confederates " of the fruits of Chickamauga." 

From the hour when Hooker entered Lookout Valley, his movements had 
been keenly watched by the Confederates on Lookout Mountain, and at mid- 
night [October 28, 29] a strong body of them swept down from the hills and 
fell suddenly upon the Nationals at Wauhatchie, commanded by General 
Geary, expecting to surprise them. They were mistaken. Geary was awake, 
and met the attack bravely; and, with the help of troops from Howard's 
(Eleventh) corps, repulsed the assailants, and scattered them in every direc- 
tion. From that time the safe passage of the river, from Bridgeport to 
Brown's Ferry, was secured. Bragg's 
plans for starving the National army 
were defeated, and a little steamboat, 
called Chattanooga^ was soon carry- : 
ing 2)rovisions up the river, in abun- 
dance.* 

While these events were occurring 
near Chattanooga, others of importance 

wei'e seen in the great Valley of East 7;fi^-i— —LLjJ 7 

Tennessee. Burnside's forces were busied -' ^ 

in endeavors to drive the armed rebels ^; 2r 

out of that region, and in so doing sev- '^^^ 

eral skirmishes and heavier engagements ^^^ Chattanooga. 

occurred, the most prominent of which 

were at Blue Springs and Rogersville, Meanwhile, Longstreet was sent by 

' Eighteen hundred troops, under General Hazen, went down the river in batteaux at abouf 
tnidnight [October 26 and 27], gliding unobserved by the Confederate sentinels along the base of 
Lookout Mountain, where the Tennessee sweeps around Moccasin Point, and, with other troops 
that went down by land, seized Brown's Ferry and threw a pontoon bridge across the river there. 
Hooker's troops coming up, connected with those at the ferry, and secured its possession to the 
Nationals. 

* There was no steamboat to be found on the Tennessee River in that region, so mechanics of 
the army built one for the public service, and called it Chattanooga. 




gg3 '^'^^^ XATIOX. [1863. 

Bragg to sei»«e Knoxville and drive tlie Nationals out of East Tennessee. He 
advanced swiftly and secretly, and on the 20th of October struck the first 
startling blow at the outpost of Philadelphia, and drove the ISTationals to the 
Tennessee, at Loudon. Below that point he crossed, and moved on Knoxville, 
but was temporarily checked by Burnside in a severe fight at Campbell's Sta- 
tion, each losing between three and four hundi*ed men. Burnside fell back to 
Knoxville, where he Avas strongly intrenched, closely followed by Longstreet, 
who began a regular siege of the place. 

While the Confederates were besieging Knoxville, stirring events were 
occurring near Chattanooga. Grant had been waiting for the arrival of forces 
under Sherman, to enable him to advance on Bragg and send relief to Burn- 
side. So early as the 22d of September, that commander had been ordered, 
with as many troops as could be spared from the line of the Mississippi, to 
proceed to the help of Rosecrans. These troops were on the line of the Mem- 
phis and Charleston railway, at the middle of October, and toward the close 
of the month they were summoned by Grant to Stevenson, to head off an 
anticipated flank movement by Bragg, in the direction of Nashville. When 
Sherman arrived there, events were in such shape that Grant thought it proper 
to attack Bragg as speedily as possible, for the twofold purpose of preventing 
his flight southward, Avhich he suspected was his design, and to demoralize or 
weaken Longstreet's force and compel him to abandon the siege of Knoxville. 

Grant determined to aim his first heavy blow at Bragg's right, on the Mis- 
sionaries' Ridge. Sherman was directed to cross the Tennessee, and menace 
his right on Lookout Mountain, and then secretly recross, move to a point 
above Chattanooga, cross again, and advance on the Ridge. All this was 
satisfactorily done. Meanwhile, it was thought best to make a movement 
from the center, at Chattanooga. This was performed [November 23] by 
Thomas, when a commanding eminence in front of the Missionaries' Ridge^ 
called Orchard Knob, was seized by the Nationals and fortified. Hooker was 
then ordered to attack Bragg's right on Lookout Mountain early the next 
morning, so as to attract the attention of the Confederates while Sherman 
should cross the Tennessee above Chattanooga. 

Hooker performed his prescribed duty with vigor and success. He opened 
his guns upon the breastworks and rifle-pits of the Confederates along the 
steep, wooded, and broken slopes of the mountain, and then his troops, dash- 
ing vigorously forward, swept every thing before them, and captured a large 
portion of their foes on their front. Then the victors scaled the rugged sides 
of the mountain, up to the muzzles of cannon planted in a hollow far toward its 
summit, and driving the Confederates there around an arable belt in the direc- 
tion of the Chattanooga Valley, established a line firmly on the eastern face 
of the mountain, with its right resting at the palisades at its top. During a 
greater part of the struggle Avhich ended in this advantage to the Nationals, 
Lookout Mountain was hooded in a mist that went up from the Tennessee in 
the morning, and Hooker's troops were literally fighting in the clouds, and 
were hidden from their listening brethren at Chattanooga below, who heard 
the thunders, of the cannon, but could oidy get an occasional glimpse of the 



186.^.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 




Union banners.' Perceiving the danger of having their only way of retreat to 
the Chattanooga Valley cut oft", the Confederates occupying th(3 summit of the 
mountain fled at midnight, masking their retreat by an attack on the Nationals, 
i.i the gloom. In the bright sunlight and 
crisp morning air the next day, the National 
flag was seen by delighted eyes below, wav- 
ing over Pulpit Kock, on the top of Lookout 
Mountain, where, only a few days before, Jef- 
ferson Davis had stood and assured the assem- 
bled troops that all was well with the Con- 
federacy. 

While Hooker was fighting on Lookout 
Mountain, Sherman's troops were crossing 
the Tennessee on pontoon bridges. They 
were all over at noonday, and, pressing for- 
Avard, secured a position on the northern end 
flf the Missionaries' Ridge, fhat night [No- 
vember 24] both armies prepared for a struggle 
in the morning. Bragg withdrew all of his 
forces from Lookout Mountain, and concen- 
trated them on the Missionaries' Ridge; and 
on the following day [November 25, 1863] 
they were attacked there in flank and front. 
Sherman moved early along the ridge, with 

flank columns at the base on each side. Hooker descended from Lookout 
Mountain, and, entering Ross's Gap, made a similar movement upon Bragg's 



^. 



"^^ 






PULPIT ROCK. 





THE missionaries' RIDGE, FROM THE CEMETERY AT CHATTANOOGA." 

right, in the afternoon. A terrible struggle ensued, which Grant, standing on 

' During this struggle, a battery, planted on Moccasin Point, under Captain Naylor, did 
excellent service. It actually dismounted one of the guns in a Confederate battery, on the 
summit of the mountain, 1,500 feet above the river. 

'' This ridge is made up of a series of small hills, with gaps or passes between. The hUl more 
m the foreground, at the left, is Orchard Knob, on which Grant made his quarters during the 
battle of the 25lh. 



670 



THE NATION. 



[1S63. 



Orchard Knob, watched witli the most intense interest. The center, under 
Thomas, was ordered forward. The eager sokliers cleared the rifle-pit# at the 
foot of the ridge, and then scaled the acclivity. The Confederates were speedily 
driven from their stronghold, and fled in the direction of Ringgold ; and that 
night the Missionaries' Ridge blazed with the camp-fires of the victors.' Early 
the next morning, Sherman, Palmer, and Hooker went in pursuit of Bragg's 
flying army. His rear-guard, under Cleburne, the " Stonewall Jackson of the 
South," was struck at Ringgold, and, after sharp fighting, was driven. Then 
Grant's troops fell back, and General Sherman was sent to the relief of Burn- 
side. Bragg retreated to Dalton, established a fortified camp there, and was 
succeeded in command by General Joseph E. Johnston. Davis made Bragg 
General-in-Chief of the Confederate armies. 

Immediately after his arrival before Knoxville, Longstreet opened some of 
ills guns [November 18, 1863] upon the National works, and sharply attacked 

their advance, under General W. P. 
Sanders, who was in immediate com- 
mand there. A severe but short en- 
gagement ensued, in which Sanders 
was killed, and his troops were driven 
back to their works. From that time 
until the dark night of the 28th, 
Longstreet closely invested Knoxville.' 
Then, alarmed by the news of Bragg's 
disaster at Chattanooga, and being 
re-enforced by nearly all of the Con- 
federate troojis then in East Tennessee, 
he proceeded, at midnight, to assail 
Fort Sanders, the principal Avork of 
the defenses of Knoxville. It was 
a strong, bastioned earth-work. The 
troops that defended it, as well as others there, were under the immediate 
command of General Ferrero. A gallant defense was made. A heavy storming 
party of Confederates, who made a most courageous attack, Avere repulsed 




JAMES LONGSTREET. 



' The Union loss was 5,616, of whom 757 were killed. The Confederate loss was a little 
over 9,000, of whom 6,000 were prisoners. Grant captured, 40 pieces of cannon and 7,000 
small-arms. General Halleck said, in a report of tlie operations of the army: "Considering the 
strength of the rebel position and the diflficulty of storming his intrenchments, the Battle of 
Chattanooga must be regarded as the most remarkable in history. Not only did the ofBcers and 
men exhibit great skill and daring in their operations in the field, but the highest praise is also 
due to the commanding general for his admirable dispositions for dislodging the enemy from a 
position apparently impregnable." 

' When the siege commenced there was in the commissary department little more than one 
day's rations, and supplies could then be received only from the south side of the Ilolston, across 
a pontoon bridge, the foe holding the avenues of approach to Knoxville on the north side of the river. 
Burnside's efforts were directed to keeping open the country between the Holston and the French 
Broad, and every attempt of Longstreet to seize it was promptly met. A considerable quantity 
of corn and wheat, and some pork, was soon collected in Knoxville, but almost from the beginning 
of the siege the soldiers were compelled to subsist on half and quarter rations, without coffee or 
sugar. Indeed, during the last few days of the siege, the bread of their half-rations was mad» 
of clear bran. 



1863.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. Qtjl 

with fearful loss, and Knoxville was saved.' Sherman's .forces were then 
pressing forward, and on the morning of the 3d of December, when Long- 
street perceived that his army was flanked, he raised the siege, and withdrew 
toward Virginia. Then Sherman and his troops returned to Chattanooga. 
Because of the victory at the latter place and the salvation of Knoxville, the 
President recommended the loyal people to give public thanks to Almighty 
God " for the great advancement of the National cause." 

Let us now turn again to the Atlantic coast, and consider the most prom- 
inent events there after the departure of Burnside from North Carolina and 
the seizure of the coasts of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida.' Burnside left 
General Foster in command of the troops in North Carolina ; and from New 
Berne, which was his principal head-quarters, the latter sent out expeditions 
from time to time to break up rendezvous of Confederates and scatter their 
forces, for it was evident that they were watching opportunities to recapture 
lost posts in that State. Sometimes sharp skirmishes would ensue, and heavy 
losses occur. In one of his raids to Goldsboro' [December, 1862], for the pur- 
pose of damaging the Weldon and Wilmington railway, Foster lost over five 
hundred men. He attempted to establish communication with the National 
forces at Suffolk and Norfolk, but when Burnside was repulsed at Fredericks- 
burg,^ and Confederate troops sent from North Carolina to assist Lee in that 
campaign were thereby released, he abandoned further attempts at that time. 
Finally, General D. H. Hill was ordered to make a diversion in favor of Long- 
street at Suffolk,^ where, with a considerable force, he first menaced New 
Berne, and then marched on Little Washington. Pie invested that place 
[March 30, 1863], and the little garrison of twelve hundred men were speedily 
cut off from the outside world. Finally, the Fifth Rhode Island Regiment 
Avent to its relief, from New Berne [April 8], by water. The blockade of the 
river was nin [April 13], and the garrison was relieved; and when, a little 
later, Foster marched upon Hill, the latter withdrew to the interior of the 
State. During the succeeding summer Foster kept up his raids, until he was 
called to take the place of General Dix, in command at Fortress Monroe. 

Looking farther down the Atlantic coast, we observe vigorous preparations 
for an attempt to take Charleston. Admiral Dupont Avas Avorking with Gen- 
eral Hunter to that end, in the spring of 1862, when, at the middle of 3Iay, a 
slave named Robert Small (a pilot), and a few fellow-bondmen, came out of 
the harbor of Charleston in the Confederate steamer. Planter^ delivered her to 
Dupont, and communicated information concerning military affairs at Charles- 

' The charge of the storming party was greatly impeded by a novel contrivance. Between the 
abatis and rifle-pits in front of Fort Sanders, the ground was covered with the stumps of recently 
felled trees. Extending from one to another of these stumps were strong wires, about a foot 
above tlie ground, and these tripped the assailants at almost every step. Whole companies were 
prostrated by this wire net-work, and at the same time the double-shotted guns of the fort were 
playing fearfully upon them. Yet the assailants pressed up, gained the ditch, and one officer 
actually reached the parapet and planted the Confederate flag there. He soon rolled dead into 
the ditch, which was swept by a bastion cannon. Lieutenant Benjamin, chief of artillery in the 
fort, actually took bomb-shells in his hand, ignited the fuses, and threw them over into the 
ditch, where they produced great destruction of life. 

* See pages 607 and 608. ' See page 63L * See page 652. 



^^^2 '^^^^ XATvON. [1863. 

ton of great value. Iluuter concentrated troy^ps on Edisto Island, preparatory 
to throwing them suddenly upon Jameses Island, and marching swiftly on the 
deeply offending city, while other troops were sent to break up the railway 
connecting the cities of Charleston and Savannah. Meanwhile the Confed- 
erates prepared to meet the Nationals on James's Island; and, finally, when 
Union troops crossed over to that island, under the direction of General Ben- 
ham, and attacked [June 16, 1862] Confederate works at Secessionville, they 
were repulsed with great loss. This event postponed the intended march on 
Charleston, and in September Hunter was superseded by the energetic General 
O. M. Mitchel. That officer Avas making prepai'ations for vigorous measures 
for indirect operations against Charleston, when he sickened and died [Oct. 
30]. General Brannan attempted to carry out liis plans against the Charleston 
and Savannah railway, but he found that road so well guarded at points to 
Avliich lie penetrated that he could not accomplish his purpose. 

After Mitchel's death little was done by the military in the Department 
of the South until the following spring. The navy in that region was some- 
what active in other than mere blockading service. Late in February [1863], 
the famous blockade runner, JVcishville, imjarisoned in the Ogeechee River, 
below Savannah, was attacked by the " monitor " MontmcJc, commanded by 
Captahi John L. Worden, and destroyed [Feb. 28, 1863]. She had been lying 
under the protection of the guns of Fort McAllister, and upon this work Com- 
mander Drayton tried the guns of some armored vessels a few days later, but 
without serious effect. Meanwhile Admiral Dupont was preparing for a vigor- 
ous attack on Charleston. Hunter was again in command of the Department 
of the South, and was strengthened, for co-operation with Dupont, by twelve 
thousand troops from North Carolina. Four thousand men, under General 
Truman Seymoui-, Avere stationed in a masked position on Folly Island at the 
beginning of April, and on the 6th of that month Dupont crossed Charleston 
bar with nine " monitor " A^essels, leaving five gun-boats outside as a reserA-e 
squadron. It had been determined by the gOA^ernraent to speedily reduce the 
offending city to subjection, for resisting forces Avere yet intensely actiA'e 
there.' 

Dupont moved up to attack Fort Sumter, the most formidable obstacle in 
the way to Charleston. The Confederate batteries near Avere ominously silent, 
xmtil the advanced vessels became entangled in a terrible net-AVork of torpe- 
does and other obstructions. Then Fort Sumter, and other batteries, bearing 
an aggregate of nearly three hundred guns, opened a concentric fire upon the 
assailants, repulsed them after a sharp fight, and destroyed the lueokuk, one 
of the smaller but most daring of the monitors. The fact Avas, the harbor 
was filled with formidable obstructions, and around it were guarding batteries 



' At the close of January [1863] two formidable "rams" darted out of Charleston harbor 
in the obscurity of darkness and fog, and attacked the blockading squadron. Two of the ships 
were quickly disabled, and compelled to strike their colors. Although the assailants fled back to 
Charleston without taking possession of the disabled vessels, the " government " at Richmond 
actually proclaimed to the world that the blockade of Charleston harbor was raised. 



1863.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION 



673 



of great strength,' and the attempt to enter it was necessarily a failure. The 
land troops were not in a condition to co-operate, excepting in the event of 
the reduction of Fort Sumter. 

There was comparative quiet along the coasts of South Carolina and Geor- 
gia for some time after Dupont's attack on Fort Sumter, General Hunter was 
succeeded [June 12, 1863] Ly General Q. A. Gillmore,' He found a little less 
than eighteen thousand troops in the Department, with arduous duties to per- 
form,^ There were eighty cftective cannon and an ample supply of small-arms, 
munitions and stores, at his command. With these forces and supplies he set 
about organizing an expedition for the capture of Charleston by troops and ships. 
He determined to seize Morris Island and its fortifications, and from it batter 
doAvn Fort Sumter and lay the city in ashes by his shells, if not surrendered. 
Dupont, having no faith in the scheme so far as the navy was concerned, was 
relieved of the command of the fleet there, and was succeeded by Admiral 
Dahlgi-en on the 6th of July.* 

Gillmore found Folly Island, next to Morris Island, well occupied by Union 
troops on his arrival. He caused batteries to be erected to bear upon the lat- 
ter, so as to make way for his 
forces to cross Light-House In- 
let to that island, and attack 
Fort Wagner. These fortifica- 
tions were well made behind a 
curtain of pine-trees, under the 
direction of General Vogdes, 
and a large number of cannon, 
mostly Parrott guns, were 
planted on them. Then General Terry was sent to James's Island with a force 

' The fortifications consisted of two batteries on Sullivan's Island seaward from Fort Moultrie, 
and Battery Bee, landward from it. On Mount Pleasant, on the main near the mouth of Cooper 
River, was a heavy battery. In front of the city was Castle Pinckney ; and on a submerged 
sand-bank, between this work and Fort Johnson, was Fort Ripley, or Middle-ground Battery. 
Along the southern border of the harbor were Fort Johnson 
and some batteries. On Morris Island, not far from Fort Sum- 
ter, was Battery Gregg, on Cummings's Point, from which the 
first shot was hurled at Fort Sumter in 1861 ; and back of it 
was Fort Wagner, a very strong work, stretching entirely 
across Morris Island at that point. Across the channels of 
TORPEDO. the harbor, rows of piles had been driven, and there were chains 

composed of railway iron linked ; and across the main channel 
a cable was stretched, from which hung festoons of torpedoes in the form given in the engraving, 
which were to be exploded by electricity, through wires extending from apparatus at Forts Sumter 
and Moultrie. At one point, where a "space in the row of piles had been left open, inviting a ship 
to enter, was a submerged mine containing 5,000 pounds of gunpowder. 
■■^ See page 607. 

= The Department did not extend far in the interior, but its line parallel with the coast was 
about two hundred and fifty miles in length. This was to be picketed, and posts at different 
•points were to be maintained. ,^ 

* At about the time of Gillmore's arrival, rumors reached Dupont that a powerful " ram 
was nearly ready, at Savannah, to make a raid on his blockading squadron, near the mouth of 
the Savannah River. This was the swift blockade-runner Fmgal, which, unable to escape to sea, 
had been converted into an armored warrior of the most formidable kind, and named Atlanta. 
Dupont sent two monitors ( Weehawkm and Nahant) to "Warsaw Sound to watch her. She appeared 
in those waters on the morning of the 17th of June. She was supposed by the Confederates to 
be an overmatch for botli monitors; and gun-boats, filled with spectators, accompanied her to tow 

43 




PARROTT GUN. 




674 



THE NATION. 



[186S. 



to mask the real intentions of the Nationals, when General Strong, with two 
thousand men, went in boats to Morris Island, landed suddenly [July 10, 
1863], and, with the help of the batteries on Folly Island, drove the Confed- 
erates to Fort Wagner. Strong allowed his troops to rest until the next morn- 
ing, when he assailed Fort Wagner, but was repulsed. These movements 
greatly alarmed the Confederates, and Beauregard and the Mayor of Charles- 
ton advised all non-combatants to leave the city. 

Fort Wagner was stronger than Gillmore suspected it to be, and he deter- 
mined to attempt to reduce it, first by a bombardment, and if that failed, then 
by a regular siege. A line of batteries were erected across the island within 
range of Fort Wagner, and Dahlgren's fleet took position to open fire on that 
work. This was done by the land and naval foi-ces on the 18th [July], with a 
hundred great guns ; and while, at sunset, a heavy thunderstorm was sweeping 
by, arrangements were made for another assault on the fort. Terry had with- 
drawn from James's Island after a sharp fight, and now Gillmore's troops were 
concentrated for the important work. Two assaulting columns moved upon 
the fort. The first, under General Strong, was repulsed with great slaughter. 
The second, and smaller one, under Colonel H. S. Putnam, met a similar fate.' 
Gillmore now abandoned the plan of direct assault, and began a regular 
siege, approaching the fort by parallels. He also, with great labor, planted a 

battery in the midst of 
^ ~ ^^ ^^ a marsh between Morris 

^^fe^^^ =^^i=~^r -^^ an(j James's Islands, on 

which was mounted a 
200-pounder Parrott gun, 
called "The Swamp An- 
gel," from which shells 
were hurled into Charles- 
ton, a distance of five 
miles.^ Finally, Gill- 
more's preparations for 
attack on Fort Wagner 
were completed, and ^n 
the iVth of August fire 
from twelve batteries, and from Dahlgren's fleet, was opened upon it and Fort 
Sumter. Before nio;ht the walls of the latter began to crumble, and its ffuns 




THE SWAMP ANGEL. 



back to Savannah the captured iron-clads. She first encountered the Weehawken. Four shots 
from the latter caused the Atlanta to haul down her colors; and instead of sweeping the block- 
ading squadron from the coast, and opening southern ports to the commerce of the world, as was 
expected by the Confederates, she was sent to Philadelphia, and exhibited for the benefit of the 
Union Volunteer Refreshment Saloon of that city. 

' Strong was mortally wounded, and Putnam was killed. In this assault a regiment of col- 
ored troops from Massachusetts, under Colonel Shaw, performed gallant deeds. Shaw was killed, 
and the Confederates, supposing they were disgracing the young hero, buried him in a pit in the 
sand under a large number of his slain negro troops. 

■■' The mud on which this battery was constructed was about sixteen feet in depth. Piles 
were driven through it to the solid earth, and on these, timbers were laid. Colonel Serrell, of 
New York, had the matter in charge, and he assigned to a lieutenant the superintendence of the 
work. When the spot chosen for building the battery was shown to the latter, he said the thing 
was impossible. "There is no such word as 'impossible' in the matter," the colonel answered. 



i863.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



675 



were silenced, under tlie pounding of Dahlgren's cannon. The land troops 
pushed the parallels closer to Fort Wagner, and at near midnight, of September 
6th, Terry was prepared to storm the works. It was soon ascertained that the 
Confederates had abandoned them, Gillmore immediately took possession of 
Fort Wagner and Battery Gregg, turned their guns upon Fort Sumter and 
Charleston, and made the " Cradle of Secession " a desolation in the world of 
business. Fort Sumter was made apparently harmless, yet a garrison remained 
there, and Avhen one night [Sept. 8] a party from the fleet attempted to sur- 
prise and capture the fort, they were repulsed with terrible loss. Finally, late 
in October, Gillmore opened heavy guns upon it, and made it a sloping heap 
of rubbish from the parapet to the water.' 

Let us now change our field of observations, in the extended theater of the 
war, fx-om the sea-coast to the region beyond the Mississippi River, a thousand 
miles farther westward, and see what of importance occurred there since the 
battle of Prairie Grove,^ the re-occupation of all Texas by the Confederates,^ 
Banks's march to the Red River,* and the battle at Helena,Mn July, 1863. 
Missouri and Arkansas, after brief repose, were convulsed by the machinations 
of disloyal citizens and the contests of hostile troops. Marmaduke, a noted 
leader, suddenly burst out of Arkansas, and fell upon Springfield, in Missouri, 
early in 1863, when he was repulsed with a loss of two hundred men. After 
reverses at other points, he fled back into Arkansas early in February. There 
were some stirring movements in Northwestern Arkansas at about the same 
time. Two thousand Confederates attacked a Union force under Colonel Har- 
rison, at Fayetteville [April 18, 1863], when the assailants were repulsed, and 
fled over the Ozark mountains. 

Marmaduke, meanwhile, had gone to Little Rock, the capital of Arkansas, 
and there, with the chief leaders in that region, planned a raid into Missouri, 
chiefly for the purpose of capturing National stores at Cape Girardeau, on the 
Mississippi River. With about eight thousand men, he pushed rapidly into 
that State, and following the general line of the St. Francis River to Freder- 
icton, turned eastward, and moved on Cape Girardeau. General McNeil was 
there to receive him, and after a severe engagement [April 26, 1863], drove 
Marmaduke out of the State. 

In May, three thousand Confederates, under Colonel Cofiey, menaced Fort 
Blunt [May 20] in the Indian country just west of Arkansas, but did not ven- 

and directed the lieutenant to build the battery, and to call for every thing required for the work. 
The next day the lieutenant, who was something of a wag, made a requisition on the quarter- 
master for one hundred men, eighteen feet in height, to wade through mud sixteen feet deep, 
and then went to the surgeon to inquire if he could splice the eighteen-feet men, if they were 
furnished him. This pleasantry caused the lieutenant's arrest, but he was soon released, and 
constructed the work witli men of usual height. — Davis's History of the One Hundred and Fourth 
Pennsylvania Regiment, page 253. 

' In his annual report to Congress, in December, 1863, the Secretary of the Navy, in summing 
up the operations of that arm of the service on the Southern coast, said : " Not a blockade runner 
has succeeded in reaching tlie city for months, and the traffic wiiich had been to some extent, 
and witli large profits, previously carried on, is extinguished. As a commercial mart, Charleston 
has no existence ; her wealth, her trade, has departed. In a military or strategic view, the place 
is of little consequence ; and whether the rebels are able, by great sacrifice and exhaustion, to 
bold out a few weeks, more or less, is of no importance." 

' See page 637. ' See page 644. * See page 644. ' See note 2, page 666. 



0Y6 ^^^ NATION. [1863. 

ture to attack. So they moved off, with a large drove of cattle, for some 
weaker prey. A little more than a month later, a wagon-train for Fort Blunt 
was attacked [July l] by Texans and Creek Indians. These were repulsed, 
and the train reached the fort in safety. Just then a great peril threatened 
that post. Six thousand Confederates were approaching to assail it. General 
Blunt had just arrived. He at once led three thousand troops, with twelve 
light cannon, to attack the Confederates. He found them at Honey Springs, 
under General Cooper, where he fell upon them suddenly. After two hours' 
hard fighting [July 1 7], the Confederates gave way. Only an hour afterward, 
General Cabell, whom Cooper was expecting, came up with three thousand 
Texan cavalry. It was too late. Cabell did not think it prudent to attack 
Blunt, and so he moved across the Canadian River into Texas. 

Guerrilla bands were now active in Blunt's rear. Early in August, about 
three hundred of these, composed chiefly of desperate characters of Missouri, 
and led by a white savage, who had assumed the name of Quantrell, crossed 
into Kansas, and attacked the town of Lawrence [August 13], inhabited chiefly 
by Unionists. The town was wholly without defenders, and the guerrillas 
murdered people and destroyed property without hinderance. In the course 
of a few hours, one hundred and forty persons were murdered, and one hun- 
dred and eighty-flve buildings were in flames. This crime produced horror 
and indignation ; and when, ten- days afterward, the guerrilla chief, M. Jeff. 
Thompson, was captured, it was very difiicult to shield him from personal 
injui-y. 

Soon after the capture of Vicksburg, General Steele organized an expedi- 
tion at Helena for the capture of Little Rock. He moved, on the 10th of 
August, with about twelve thousand men and forty cannon. He crossed the 
White River at Clarendon, and pushing back the Confederates under Marma- 
duke, reached the Arkansas, below Little Rock, on the 7th of September. A . 
part of his forces, under General Davidson, crossed to the south bank, and 
upon opposite sides of the river the two columns moved on Little Rock. Mar- 
maduke made some opposition, but with General Price and others, and all the 
troops in that vicinity, he abandoned the Arkansas capital, leaving several 
steamers on fire. On the evening of the 10th [Sept., 1863], Steele's forces 
occupied the city and the fortifications. The Confederates retreated rapidly 
to Arkadelphia, on the Washita River, This successful campaign occupied 
forty days. 

Blunt, meanwhile, was trying to bring the Confederates and Indians in the 
region west of Arkansas to battle, but failed to do so; and Cabell, with a large 
force, hastened to the aid of Price at Little Rock. He did not reach there in 
time, but joined Price in his retreat to Arkadelphia. Blunt took possession of 
Port Smith, and garrisoned it ; and early in October, when on his way from 
Kansas to that post, with an escort of a hundred cavalry, he was attacked 
[October 4], near Baxter's Springs, by Quantrell and six hundred guerrillas. 
The escort was demolished ; an accompanying train was plundered and burned, 
and Blunt, with about a dozen followers, barely escaped with their lives to 
Little Fort Blair. The Confederates in that region, now finding their supplies 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



G7r 



to be nearly exhausted, a part of Cabell's command, under Colonel Shelby, 
undertook a raid into Missouri, to procure some. In the southwestern part of 
that State they were joined by a considerable force under Coffey, when the 
combined army was twenty-five hundred strong. They penetrated the State 
to Booneville [October 1, 1863], on tho Missouri River, but were quickly 
driven back into Arkansas by Generals Brown and McNeil, when the lattei- 
was placed in command of the Army of the Frontier. Comparative quiet 
prevailed in Missouri and Arkansas after that for some time, the only hostile 
movement of note being an attack [Oct. 25] by Marmaduke upon Pine Bluff, 
on the Arkansas River, with two thousand men and twelve guns. The little 
garrison, und^r Colonel Clayton, with the help of two hundred negi-oes in 
making barricades, drove off the assailants, after a contest of sevex-al houi-s. 

Let us now see what w^as occurring west of the Mississippi, in the Gulf 
Department, commanded by General N". P. Banks. When that commander 
withdrew from Alexan- 
dria, on the Red River, 
to invest Port Hudson,' 
General Dick Taylor, 
Avhom he had driven intn 
the wilds of Western 
Louisiana, returned, took 
possession of the aban- 
doned towns of Alexan- 
dria and Opelousas, and 
garrisoned Fort de Rus- 
sy, early in June [18G3]. 
Then he swept rapidly 
through the State toward 
the Mississippi, and in 
the direction of New Orleans, causing Banks to draw in his outposts to 
Brashear City. But this post was soon captured [June 24, 1868], with an 
immense amount of public property, and a thousand prisoners.* A few days 
later, a Confederate force, under General Green, attempted to seize Fort 
Butler [June 20], at Donaldsonville, on the Mississippi, but were repulsed, 
Avith a loss of over three hundred men ; and, on the 1 2th of July, the same 
leader attacked some troops under General Dudley, in the rear of Donaldson- 
ville, when, after a partial success, the Confederates were driven, and retreated 
out of that district. This was about the last struggle of Taylor's troops to 
gain a foothold on the Mississippi, for Banks's force, released by the fall of 
Port Hudson,^ quickly expelled the Confederates from the region eastward of 
the Atchafalaya. 




FORT DE RUSSY. 



' See page 644. 

' The Confederates took possession of the fort there, with its ten guns : also, a large amount 
of small-anns, munitions of war, provisions. &c., the whole valued at full $2,000,000. A thousand 
refugee negroes were also seized there, and remanded into slavery worse than they had endured 
before. ' See page 64&. 



QhQ ' THE NATION. [1863. 

Banks now turned his thoughts to aggressive movements. Grant visited 
him early in September, Avhen the two leaders united in an earnest expression 
of a desire to move, with their combined forces, on Mobile. But the represent- 
ations of Texan loyalists, then in Washington City, caused the government 
to order an expedition for the recovery of Texas. Banks fitted out one, to 
make a lodgment in that State at Sabine Pass, on the boundary-line between 
Louisiana and Texas. He sent four thousand veteran troops for the purpose, 
under General Franklin ; and Admiral Farragut detailed, as a co-operative 
naval force, four gun-boats, under Lieutenant Crocker, The expedition crossed 
the bar at Sabine Pass on the 8th of September [1863], when, instead of the 
troops landing, according to instructions, and taking the Confedirate works in 
reverse, the gun-boats proceeded to make a direct attack. They were repulsed 
by a handful of men behind a small work, armed Avith eight guns,' and the 
expedition returned to New Orleans, leaving behind two steamers, with fifteen 
rifled-guns, two hundred men as prisoners, and fifty men killed and wounded. 

The notice given to tl* Confederates by this unfortunate expedition, of a 
■design to invade Texas coastwise, caused an abandonment of the scheme at that 
time, and Banks concentrated his forces on the Atchafalaya, for the purpose 
of penetrating that State by way of Shreveport, on the Red River. There 
appeared insuperable obstacles to an expedition over that route. Banks deter- 
mined to make an attempt to seize and hold the harbors of that commonwealth 
on the coast. General C. C. Washburn was ordered to mask the movement 
l)y marching from Brashear toward Alexandria, and, on the 26th of October, 
an expedition, consisting of about six thousand troops and some war-vessels, 
rsailed from New Orleans directly for the Rio Grande. The troops, under the 
immediate command of General Dana, landed at Brazos Santiago, drove some 
Confederate cavalry toward Brownsville, thirty miles up the river, and, fol- 
lowing them, reached that post on the 6th of November. Detachments were 
sent to other points, and in the space of a month National troops took posses- 
sion of Texan seaports and fortified posts on the coast, from the Rio Grande 
eastward, to near the mouth of the Brazos. Only the latter place, and Galves- 
ton Island, were now held by the foe. There they had formidable works. At 
the close of the year all Texas west of the Colorado was abandoned by them.' 

' This fort had a garrison of 200 men ; but, at the time of the attack, all but forty-two were 
absent. Those present were chiefly Irishmen, and belonged to an organization known as the 
"Davis Guards." For their gallantry on this occasion, Jefterson Davis presented each man with 
a small silver medal, a representation of which may be found in Lossing's Pictorial Field-Book of 
the Civil War. iii., 222. 

" While the events we have just noticed were occurring in the region westward of the 
Lower Mississippi, others, having a slight bearing upon the war, occurred on the same side of the 
great river, in the region of its upper waters. This was a war with the Siou.T tribe of Indians, in 
the State of Minnesota. It broke out in the summer of 1862, when Little Crow, a saintly-looking 
friavage in civilized costume, led his fellow-savages in the butchery of the white inhabitants at 
different places along tlie frontier settlements. These warriors besieged Forts Ripley and Aber- 
^i-rorabie in the autumn, and in that region they massacred about five hundred white people — men, 
women, and children. Finally, troops under General Sibley captured about five hundred of tlic 
■savages, and thirty-seven of the worst offenders were hanged. Little Crow wn.s shot by a ppvate 
.citizen wliile the savage was picking blackberries. His skeleton is preserved in *.he Minnesota 
Historical Society. The war was not ended until the summer of 1863, when General Pope w-as 
in command of that Department. 



1863.J LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. g^Q 

Before proceeding to a consideration of military affairs in 1864, let us take 
a brief glance at the aspect of civil affairs at the beginning of that year. The 
management of the finances of the nation were yet in the hands of Mr. Chase.' 
The public debt had then reached the appalling sum of considerably over 
$1,000,000,000;' the great war was in full career, and the debt was increasing 
every day ; and yet the public credit, among American citizens, never stood 
liigher. " The history of the world," said the Secretary of the Treasury, a 
year later, when he had been fully sustained by the people, " may be searched 
in vain for a parallel case of popular financial support to a National move- 
ment." The Secretary, in his report to Congress in 1862, had shown that, to 
meet all demands to the close of the fiscal year, at the end of June, 1864 
(eighteen months), provision must be made for raising over $900,000,000 more. 
Such a demand would have appalled the representatives of a less hopeful 
people. But they met the matter firmly, and took measures for raising the 
money. The people manifested their confidence in the government, by lending 
it, within the space of two months after the adjournment of Congress [March 
3, 1863], 1169,000,000. 

The finances of the Confederates were in a deplorable condition at the 
beginning of 1864. Their jiublic debt, in round numbers, was $1,000,000,000, 
with a prospective increase at the end of the year to full $2,000,000,000. The 
<;urrency in circulation amounted to $600,000,000, and Avas so depreciated that 
the "government" could see nothing but ruin ahead. Few persons, besides 
deceived and sympathizing Europeans, particularly Englishmen,' could be in- 
duced to take the " government " bonds willingly. The producers of the 
Confederacy were unwilling to take the promises of the " government " to 
jtay for their products, and want had threatened their army with destruction. 
So the authorities at Richmond had boldly adopted the measure of seizing 
supplies for their armies ; and, for the purpose of keeping their ranks full, 
Iiad passed a law declai'ing, in substance, every white man in the Confederacy, 
liable to bear arms, to be in the military service, and that upon failure to re- 
port for duty at a military station within a certain time, he was liable to the 
2)enalty of death as a deserter.* 

Notwithstanding these disabilities and the fading away of every hope of 
recognition by foreign governments, or the moral support of any civilized 
people,* the Conspirators at Rich mond, holding the reins of despotic power 

' See page 560. ^ ..,,,,. . 

•■' The National debt on the first of July, 1863, was $1,098,793,181. It was estimated that at 
the same period in 1804 it would be $1,686,956,190. The average rate of interest on the whole 
debt, without regard to the varying margin between coin and notes, had been reduced from 4-36 
per cent., on the first of July, 1862, to 3-77 per cent, on the first of July, 1863. _ ^ ,, ^ 

^ The Confederates negotiated a loan in Europe of $15,000,000, on the security of cott»n to 
be sent abroad and sold. Members of the Southern Independence Association, m England, com- 
posed of persons of the ruling class, were heavy losers by the transaction. _ , , . ,< ,. .„ 

* The history of civilized nations has no paraUel to this act Mr. Davis and bis cabinet 
had then reached a critical point in their career. They well knew that f^^^'-^J^their tre- 
mendous undertaking would be ruin to themselves, and they seemed willing Jo sacnfice every 
man, ruin every family, waste all the property in the Confederacy, and s««^then^ fair section 
of the Republic converted into a wilderness in a desperate effort to win success. 1 hey seemed 
to regard the "common people" as of no account. u;^„f^„ fr^rwarHp^l tr. 

^ On the 1st of April, 1864, Lord Lyons, the British minister ^t Wash ngton, om^^^^ 
Jefferson Davis, by permission of our government, a letter from Earl ^"^^^"^^h', ? .^^if^,*,^^^^^^^^^ 
Secretary, in which, in the name of "her Majesty's government." he protested agaln^t the further 



580 THE NATION. [1863. 

with firm grasp, resolved to carry on the war regardless of consequences to 
their wearied and oppressed people. They employed the President's Proclama- 
tion of Emancipation ' as a means for " firing the Southern heart," and they 
put foi-th the grossest misrepresentations to deceive the people. They devised 
schemes for retaliation, and the most cruel measures toward negro troops and 
their white commandei's were proposed. They refused to recognize captive 
negro soldiers as prisoners of war, and sought, by threats of vengeance, to 
deter negroes from enlisting. But more prudent counsels prevailed, for it Avas 
seen that such measures might be retorted with fearful efiect. The President 
stood firm concerning emancipation. His proclamation was the exponent of 
the future policy of the government. Congress passed laws in consonance 
with it. The organization of negro troops for military service was authorized 
and carried out, and the government took the just ground that all its soldiers 
should have equal protection. The slave-holders were exasperated. The 
Peace Faction protested. The loyal people said to the government, Be firm. 
" The signs," the President said, " look better." 'More than fifty thousand 
square miles had been recovered from the Confederates in the West. The 
autumn elections [1863] showed that the friends of the government, who had 
spoken at the ballot-box, were overwhelming in numbers and moral strength. 
The government took fresh coui-age, and adopted measures for a vigorous 
military campaign in 1864. The President, with the hope of weakening the 
moral strength of the Confederates issued a generous Amnesty Proclamation,^ 

procuring of pirate vessels within the British dominions by the Confederates. After courteously 
reciting facts connected with the matter, RusseLl said: "Under these circumstances, her Majesty's 
government protests and remonstrates against any further efforts being made on the part of the 
so-called Confederate States, or the authorities or agents thereof, to build, or cause to be built, or 
to purchase, or cause to be purchased, any such vessels as* those styled 'rams,' or any other ves- 
sels to be used for war purposes against the United States, or against any country witli which 
the United Kingdom is at peace and on terms of amity; and her Majesty's government further 
protest and remonstrates against all acts in violation of the neutrality laws of the realm." 

These words from one who, personally and as the representative of the British government, 
had given the insurgents all the "aid and comfort " a wise business prudence would allow, kindled 
the hottest indignation of the chief leaders, and Jefferson Davis instructed one of his assistants 
(Burton N. Harrison) to reply that it "would be inconsistent with the dignity of the position he 
[J. Davis] fills as Chief Magistrate of a nation comprising a population of more than twelve mil- 
lions, occupying a territory many times larger than the United Kingdom, and possessing resources 
unsurpassed by those of any other country on the face of the globe, to allow the attempt of Earl 
Russell to ignore the actual existence of the Confederate States, and to contemptuously style them 
' so-called,' to pass without a protest and a remonstrance. The President, therefore, does pro- 
test and remonstrate against this studied insult ; and he instructs me to say that in future any 
document in which it may be repeated will be returned unanswered and unnoticed." The scribe 
of the irate "President " added: "Were, indeed, her Majesty's government sincere in a desire 
and a determination to maintain neutrality, the President would not but feel that they would 
neither be just, nor gallant to allow the subjugation of a nation like the Confederate States, by 
such a barbarous, despotic race as are now attempting it." 

' See page 640. 

^ The President offered full pardon, and restoration of all rights of property, excepting as to 
slaves, to all persons (with specified exceptions), who had participated in the rebellion, who should 
take a prescribed oath of allegiance to the government. The persons excepted were all who were 
or had been civil or diplomatic agents of the so-called Confederate government; all who had left 
judicial stations under the United States to aid the rebellion : all who were or had been military 
or naval officers of the so-called Confederate government above the rank of colonel in the army 
and lieutenant in the nav}' ; all who left seats in the National Congress to aid the rebellion ; all 
who resigned commissions in the National Army or Navy, and afterward aided the rebellion; and 
all who had engaged in any way in treating colored persons, or white persons in charge of such, 
otherwise than lawfully as prisoners of war. 



1864.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. ggj 

and a prescription for the reorganization of States wherein rebellion existed. 
The new Congress (XXXVIIIth) had heavy majorities of loyal members in 
both Houses, 

The National forces in the field at the opening of 1864 numbered about 
800,000. Those of the Confederates were about half that number. The former 
Avere ready and disposed to act on the offensive ; the latter, generally, stood 
on the defensive. The government and people were tired of delays and the 
almost indecisive warfare of posts, as the struggle had been up to this time. 
It was evident that proper vigor in the control of the armies could only be 
obtained by placing that control in the hands of one competent man in the 
field. For this purpose Congress created the office of Lieutenant-General. 
The President nominated Ulysses S, Grant to fill it. The Senate confirmed 
the nomination [March 2, 1864], and that successful leader was commissioned 
[March 8] General-in-Chief of the Armies of the United States, and made his 
head-quarters in the field, with the Army of the Potomac. 

Grant had no sympathy with a system of warfare half coercive and half 
persuasive. That had been tried too long for the public good. He believed 
his government to be right and the Confederates wrong. He regarded sharp 
and decisive blows as the most merciful in the end, and calculated to save life 
and treasure, and so he resolved to make Avar with all the terrible intentions of 
war, and end it. He at once organized two grand expeditions, having for 
their geographical objectives the capture of Richmond in Virginia and Atlanta 
in Georgia ; and their prime object was the destruction of the two great 
armies of the Conspirators, commanded by Lee and Johnston. The Army of 
the Potomac, destined to conquer Lee, Avas placed under the command of 
General George G. Meade ; that intended to fight Johnston Avas intrusted to 
General W. T. Sherman. Events proved the wisdom of Grant's choice. 

Before considering these great campaigns, let us notice, briefly, other 
important movements in the country between the mountains and the Missis- 
sippi River, and the region beyond that stream. 

When Sherman went to the assistance of Rosecrans,' he left General J. B.. 
McPherson in command at Vicksburg. Late in October [1863] that officer 
Avent out with about eight thousand men, to drive the Confederates from the 
line of the raihvay between Jackson and Canton, but Avas met by a superior 
force [October 21], and returned Avithout fighting. MeauAvhile, the Confed- 
erate guerrilla chief, Forrest, Avith about four thousand men, broke into West 
Tennessee fi-om Northern Mississippi, and making Jackson, in that State, his 
head-quarters [December], sent out foraging parties in various directions. 
Troops Avere sent by Hurlbut, at Memphis, to catch him, but he managed to- 
escape Avith much plunder. Sherman soon afterward reappeared in Mississippi,, 
and on the 3d of February he left Vicksburg with about tAventy-three thou- 
sand effective men, for a grand raid through that State, in the direction of 
Montgomery, in Alabama, and to march on Mobile, if circumstances should 
warrant the movement. General (Bishop) Polk Avas then in command in that 

' See page 668. 



682 



THE NATION. 



ri8C4. 



reo-ion, with a large force of infantry and cavalry. He made but a feeble 
resistance, and fell back as Sherman moved victoriously to Meridian, at the 
intersection of important railways. There the latter halted, and waited for 
a division, chiefly of cavalry, under General W. S. Smith, expected from 
Tennessee. Sherman's path from Jackson to Meridian, was marked by the 
destruction of the railway, its station-houses and rolling stock, besides stores 
and other public property ; and during a week that he staid at Meridian he 
made the most complete destruction of railroads each way from that point. 
In the mean time Smith failed to join him. He started late, and was driven 
back by a Confederate force under Forrest and others. Shermazi, at the end 
of a week, laid Meridian in ashes, and returned to Vicksburg with four hun- 
dred i^risoners, a thousand white Union refugees, and about five thousand 
negroes. His raid spread dismay throughout the Confederacy, from the Mis- 
sissippi to the Savannah, and inflicted a heavy loss on the foe.' 

Sherman's raid caused Johnston, at Dalton, in Northern Georgia, to send 
troops to the aid of Polk. Informed of this. Grant, at ChattanoQga, sent the 
Fourteenth Army Corps, under General Palmer, to menace Johnston and 
•compel him to recall his detachments. The retrograde movement of Sherman 
■caused these detachments to fall back, when Palmer, confronted by a superior 
force, after some severe fighting [February, 1864], between Ringgold and 
Dalton, returned to Chattanooga. 

Forrest, whose sphere of duty had been enlarged, M'as now charged with 
that of preventing re-enforcements from reaching Johnston's opponent, from 
the region of the Mississippi, by keeping them employed there. Late in 
March he made a rapid raid through Tennessee and Kentucky, to the Ohio at 
Paducah, with about five thousand men, capturing Union City and Hickman 
by the way. He assailed the fort and garrison at Paducah, under Colonel 

Hicks, and was repulsed. 



when he hurried to attack 
Fort Pillow, on the Miss- 
issippi, above Memphis, 
^ commanded by Major L. 
H F. Booth, Avith a garrison 
, composed largely of col- 
ored troops. This post 
Forrest besieged on the 
13th of April. Booth was 
assisted in the defense by 
^ the gun-boat A^?o M'a, 
=^ Captain Marshall, but was 
overcome by a trick rather 
than by arms. Forrest 



«., 




sent in a flag of truce, demanding a surrender of the fort, and while it was 



' The sum of injury done to the Confederates during Sherman's raid, including that of Smith, 
•nd an expedition which Porter sent simultaneously to attack Yazoo City and distract the Con- 



i864.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. ggg 

there, and the summons was under consideration, he secretly placed large 
numbers of his troops in ravines near, Avhere they might effectually fall upon 
the fort from points where their presence was least expected. This was done, 
with the cry of " No quarter," Avhen a large number of the garrison, who 
threw down their arms, were slaughtered by methods most cruel. The poor 
negro troops were objects of the direst vengeance of the assailant.' " Forrest's 
motto," said Major C. W. Gibson, one of his men, to the Avriter, " was, ' War 
means fight, and fight means kill — we want but few prisoners.' " This principle 
was fully illustrated by Forrest by his cruel deed at Fort Pillow.' 

An attempt was made to intercept Forrest in his retreat southward from 
Fort Pillow. It failed. Some Aveeks later General Sturgis was sent out 
from Memphis with a large force into Mississippi, to hunt up and beat him, 
when the former was attacked near Gun Town, on the Mobile and Ohio rail- 
w^ay, by Forrest, and, after a severe battle [June 10], was compelled to fly 

federates, may be stated in general terms as follows : The destruction of 150 miles of railway, 67 
bridges, 700 trestles, 20 locomotives, 28 cars, several thousand bales of cotton, several steam 
mills, and over 2,000,000 bushels of corn. About 500 prisoners were taken, and over 8,000 
Tiegroes and refugees followed the various columns back to Vicksburg. 

The expedition sent to Yazoo City consisted of some gun-boats, under Lieutenant Owen, and 
a detachment of troops under Colonel Osband. They did not then capture the place, but inflicted 
considerable damage, and returned with a less of not more than 50 men. Yai^oo City was soon 
iiftervvard occupied by a Union force, composed of the 8th Louisiana and 200 of the Seventh Mis- 
sissippi colored troops, and the 11th Illinois. Tliey were attacked by a superior force on the 5th 
of March. A desperate fight ensued. The assailants were finally ariven away by some re-en- 
f^rcements from below, and soon afterward the town was evacuated. The Union loss in this 
struggle was 130. That of the Confederates was about the same. 

' There was much opposition to the employment of negroes as soldiers, until quite a late 
period of the war. At tiie breaking out of the rebellion, colored men in the Free-labor States 
offered their services as soldiers, but they were not accepted. When Crcneral Hunter took com- 
mand in the Department of tlie South, he proclaimed the freedom of the slaves, and was about to 
organize regiments of colored men. The government would not sanction his proceedings. When 
fieneral Phelps, commanding a short distance from New Orleans, proposed to make fighters of 
those colored men who fled into his camp from their masters, and was ordered by General Butler 
to employ them only as servants, he declared that he was not '• willing to become a mere slave- 
driver," and t-hrew up his commission and returned to Vermont. But, as the war went on, and 
prejudice gave way to necessity, the enlistment of colored men into the army was authorized. 
Tlieir usefulness was proven at Milliken's Bend, Port Hudson, Fort Wagner, and other places. 
In March, 1863, the Adjutant-General of the armies was sent to tlie Mississippi Valley for the 
purpose of promoting tlie enhstment of colored troops. During the war full 200,000 of these 
dusky soldiers were seen in the uniform of the armies of the Republic. For awhile the Confed- 
erates refused to consider them as prisoners of war and subjects of equal exchange with white 
captives. But they were finally compelled to acknowledge their equality as soldiers, and accept 
tlie conditions imposed by necessity. 

^ In a report of a sub-committee of the Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War, 
made shortly after the deed, the perpetration of the most horrible cruelties were proven. One or 
two iUnstrative instances will suffice: "All around were heard cries of 'No quarter! Kill the 
damned niggers! Shoot 'em down !' and all who asked for mercy were answered by the most 
cr\iel taunts and sneers. Some were spared for a time, to be murdered under circumstances of 

the greatest cruelty One negro, who had been ordered by a rebel officer to hold his 

horse, was killed by him when he remounted; anotlier, a mere child, whom an officer had taken 
up behind him, was seen by Chalmers [General Chalmers, one of Forrest's leaders], who at once 
ordered the officer to put him down and shoot him, which was done." They burned huts and 
leuts in which tlie wounded had sought shelter, and were still in them. "One man was deliber- 
ately fastened down to the floor of a tent, face upward, by means of nails driven througli his 
clothing and into the boards under him, so that he could not possibly escape, and then the tent 
set on fire. Another was nailed to the side of a building outside of the fort, and then the build- 
ing set on fire and burned These deeds of murder and cruelty ceased when night 

came on, only to be renewed the next morning, when tlie demons carefully sought among the 
dead, lying about in all directions, for any of tlie wounded yet alive, and those they found wera 
dehberately shot." 



g34 T2^ NATION. [18G4. 

back to Memjjhis as rapidly as possible, with very heavy loss. Another expe- 
dition, under General A. J, Smith, composed of about twelve thousand men, 
was sent on a similar errand. He fought and defeated Forrest near Tupelo 
[July 14], and then returned to Memphis. Three weeks afterward Smitli 
returned to Mississippi, with ten thousand men, in search of Forrest, but while 
he was there, that bold leader, with three thousand picked men, flanked him, 
dashed into Memphis in broad daylight, hoping to capture some Union generals 
at the Gayosa House, and then fled back to Mississippi. 

Let us now look across the Father of Waters, and see what Avas occurring 
there in 1864. 

Early in January, General Banks received orders from Hall'eck, the General- 
in-Chief of the armies, to organize an expedition for the recovery of Texas, to 
go by way of the Red River, to Shreveport, in the vicinity of Avhich was a 
considerable Confedei-ate force, under General E. Kirby Smith and other 
leaders. It Avas proposed to have troops from Sherman's command, and a fleet 
of gun-boats under Admiral Porter, to co-operate directly with Banks, while 
Steele, at Little Rock,' should more remotely aid the expedition. Accordingly, 
early in March, Porter was at the mouth of the Red River [March 7], Avith 
his fleet, and transports Avith Sherman's troops under General A. J. Smith. 
The latter Avere landed at Simms's Port on the Atchafalaya. They marched to 
Fort de Russy'^ and captured it [March 14, 1864], and then, on transports, 
went up the river to Alexandria, and took possession of the town [March 16]. 
Banks's column had marched, meauAvhile, from the vicinity of Brashear City, 
under General Franklin, and moving by Avay of Opelousas, arrived at Alex- 
andria on the 26th. Banks had arrived there two days before. Smith's troops 
Avent forAvard, driving the Confederates who were gathering on their front, and 
took post twenty miles farther up the river, in the direction of Shreveport. 

The Avater in the Red River Avas low, and falling, and it Avas Avith much 
difiiculty that the fleet and transports got above the rapids at Alexandria. 
They did so after a few days of hard labor. Banks's column, meanwhile, had 
advanced to Natchitoches, eighty miles above Alexandria [April 3], the Con- 
federates, in increasing numbers, falling back as they advanced. Smith's 
troops on transports, and the fleet, advanced to Grand Ecore, near Natchi- 
toches, and from that point the great body of the expedition moved toward 
Shreveport. The larger gun-boats could go no further, so a detachment of 
Smith's command, under General T. Kilby Smith, accompanied the transports 
and lighter gun-boats, Avith supplies for the army. 

The expedition encountered the Confederates on the Avay, now and then, 
but they invariably fell back, until they reached Sabine Cross Roads, not far 
from Mansfield, where they made a stand in heavy force. There Banks's 
cavalry, and part of his infantry and artillery, engaged in a sharp struggle 
[April 8], Avhen they were forced to retreat a short distance by overwhelming 
numbers. Franklin came up with re-enforcements late in the afternoon, when 
the whole body of National troops were routed with heavy loss of men and 

> See page 676. " See page 677. 



1SG4.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. (Jg5 

materials of war. Fortunately the fine division of General Emory was near, 
and took a stand at Pleasant Grove to receive the fugitives and resist the 
(Confederates. Another heavy battle ensued, when the Nationals were again 
victorious. They thought it prudent, however, after the battle, to fall back to 
Pleasant Hill, fifteen miles in the i*ear, for it was not certain that General 
Smith would come up in time to aid the Avearied troops on the field of victory. 
There the united forces took a strong position. The Confederates had fol- 
lowed closely, and there another severe battle was fought [April 9, 1864], 
which resulted in another victory for the Nationals. Banks proposed to move 
again toward Shreveport, in the morning, but the v;nanimous opinion of the 
oflScers of his and Smith's command, was that it would be best for the expedi- 
tion to fall back to the Red River, at Grand Ecore.' The transports and 
guarding troops, and the lighter gun-boats, which had gone up to Loggy 
Bayou, after some fighting on the way with Confederates on the banks of the 
river, joined the army at Grand Ecore. 

The troubles of the expedition were not at an end. It was determined to 
fall back to Alexandria, and it was an easy matter for the army to do so, but 
the water in the Red River was so low, and still falling, that it was difticult to 
get the fleet over the bar at Grand Ecore. This was accomplished, however, 
and on the 1 7th of April the fleet started down the river, when one of the 
vessels was sunk by a torpedo. The army moved on the 21st [April, 1864], 
but was met at the passage of the Cane River, where the Confederates, on 
Monet's Bluflf, confronted them. These were dislodged by skillful maneuvers 
and sharp fighting, and the National forces entered Alexandria on the 27th, 
after an absence of twenty-four days. Some of the fleet had a severe struggle 
with a battery at the mouth of Cane River, but the vessels ran by it in the 
darkness, excepting a pump-boat. The expedition against Shreveport was now 
abandoned, and it was determined to return to the Mississippi. 

The fleet encountered a most serious obstacle at Alexandria. The water 
was so low that it was impossible for the vessels to pass over the rapids, A 
means had been suggested, by Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Bailey, Engineer of 
the Nineteenth Corps, so early as the day of the battle at Pleasant Hill, 
when a retreat was thought of. It was to dam the river at the foot of the 
rapids, so as to deepen the water on them, and thus, when the vessels were 
there, open a sluice and allow them to go down with the deep current.* This 

' The chief reasons offered were: (I.) The difficulty in bringing his trains which had been 
sent forward on the road toward Grand Ecore, in time to move quickly after the flying Confede- 
rates; (2.) A lack of water for man or beast in that region, excepting such as the wells afforded; 
(3.) The fact that all surplus ammunition and supplies of the army were on board the transports 
sent up the river, and the impossibility of knowing whether these had reached their destination ; 
(4.) The falling of the river, which imperiled the naval part of the expedition; and (5.) The report 
of a scouting party, on the day of the battle, that no tidings could be heard of the fleet. " These 
considerations," said Banks, "the absolute deprivation of water for man or beast, the exhaustion 
of rations, and the failure to effect a connection with the fleet on the river, made it necessary for 
the army, although victorious in the struggle through which it had just passed," to retreat to a 
point where it would be certain of communicating with the fleet, and where it would have an 
opportimity for reorganization." 

^ Admiral Porter, in his dispatch to the Secretary of the Navy, said: "The work was com- 
tnenoed by running out from the left bank of the river a tree-dam, made of the bodies of very 



686 



THE NATION. 



[18G4, 



Mas done successfully. All of the Aessels passed tlic I'apids safely into the 
deep water below, made so by an upward current of the brimful Mississippi, 
one hundred and fifty miles distant. With very little further trouble, the 
whole expedition moved down to the Mississippi. At Simms's Port on the 




«. y<&/^''- 



^m^^^^^^^^' 




BAILEY'S RED RIVER DAM 



Atchafiilaya, General Canby appeared, and took command of Banks's troops, 
and the latter returned to New Orleans. General Smith returned to IMissis- 
sippi, and Porter resumed the service of patrolling the Mississippi River. 

General Steele had not been able to co-operate with the expedition, as Avas 
expected. He started southward from Little Rock late in March with about 
eight thousand troops, and was soon joined by General Thayer, commander of 
the Army of the Frontier. They pushed back Price, Marmaduke, and others, 
who opposed them in considerable force, and captured the important post of 
Camden [April 15, 1864], on the Washita River. It was a difficult one to 
hold, and Steele soon abandoned it, and returned to Little Rock, after a severe 
battle at Jenkinson's Ferry on the Sabine River. So ended, in all its parts, 
the disastrous campaign against Shreveport for the repossession of Texas. It 
failure was owing to a Radically defective plan, over which the leaders had na 
control.' 



large trees, brush, brick, and stone, cross-tied witli other heavy timber, and strengthened in every 
way ingenuity could devise. This was run about three hundred feet into the river. Four large 
coal-barges were then filled with briclc, and sunk at tlie end of it. From the right bank of the 
river cribs filled with stone were built out to meet the barges." 

' General Banks had so often objected to taking tlie route of the Red Eiver, for Texas, tliat 
when Halleck again urged it, he did not feel at liberty to demur. He laid before the General-in- 
Chief a memorial, in wliich were explicitly stated the obstructions to be encountered, and the 
measures necessary to accomplish tlie object in view. It recommended as indispensable to 
success: (1.) Such complete preliminary organization as would avoid the least delay in move- 
ments after the campaign had opened ; (2.) Tliat a line of supply be established from the Missis- 
sippi, independent of water-courses, because these would become unmanageable at certain seasons 
of the year ; (3.) The concentration of the forces west of tlie Mississippi, and such other force as 
should be assigned to this duty from General Sherman's command, in such a manner as to expel 
the enemy from Northern Louisiana and Arkansas ; (4.) Such preparation and concert of action 
among the different corps engaged as to prevent the enemy, by keeping him constantly employed, 
from operating against our positions or forces elsewhere ; and (5.) That the entire force should 
be placed under the command of a single general. Preparations for a long campaign was also 
advised, and the month of May was indicated as the point of time when the occupation of 



1864.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. ggT 

The failure of the Red River expedition, and the expulsion of Steele from 
the region below the Arkansas River, emboldened the Confederates, and they 
soon had almost absolute control of the State. Raiding parties roamed at 
will ; and very soon the Unionists were awed into silence, and the civil power, 
in a great degree, passed into the hands of the enemies of the Republic.' 
This condition of affairs was favorable to a long-contemplated invasion of 
Missouri by Price, which had both a military and political object in view. 
In the Western States, and particularly in Missouri, were secret associations in 
sympathy with the Confederates, known as Knights of the Golden Circle^ and 
" Sons of Liberty." An arrangement appears to have been made for an 
armed uprising of the members of these associations, when Price should 
enter the State, and he was induced to do so by promises of being joined by 
over twenty thousand of these disloyal men. The vigilant Rosecrans, then 
commander of the Department of Missouri,' discovered their plans, made 
some arrests, and so frightened the great mass of these secret enemies of the 
government, that when Price ajjpeared, he fcfund very few recruits. 

Price, and Shelby, with nearly twenty thousand followers, entered South- 
eastern Missouri, late in September, and pushed on to Pilot Knob, half way to 
St. Louis from the Ai'kansas line. There General Ewing, Avith a single brigade, 
struck him an astounding blow that made him very circumspect. Fortunately 
Rosecrans had just been re-enforced by volunteers from the surrounding region, 
and by troops under General A. J. Smith, which had been stopped at Cairo on 
their way to join Sherman in Northern Georgia, with others under General 
Mower, which speedily arrived. Price saw that a web of peril was rapidly 
weaving around him, so he abandoned his design of marching upon St. Louis. 
He hastened toward Jefferson City, but passed on without touching it, and 
fled toward Kansas, closely pursued. It was an exciting chase, and was made 
lively, at times, by sharp encounters. Finally, early in November, Price was 
driven into AVestern Arkansas with a broken and dispirited army. It was the 
last invasion of Missouri. 

Turning our attention eastward, at about this time, we observe some, 
stirring events in East Tennessee. After Longstreet's retirement from Knox- 
ville* he lingered some time between there and the Virginia border. General 
Foster took Burnside's place as the commander of the Union troops there. 
Some severe skirmishing occurred at different places, but no pitched battle ; 
and, finally, Longstreet withdrew into Virginia, to re-enforce the menaced army 
of General Lee. The notorious Morgan and his guerrilla band lingered in 

Shreveport might be anticipated. "Not one of these suggestions," said General Banks in his 
report, " so necessary in conquering the inherent difficulties of the expedition, was carried into 
execution, nor was it in my power to establish them." There existed that bane of success, a 
divided command Banks, Porter, and Smith, acted independently of each other, as far as they 
pleased, there being no supreme authority to compel unity or co-operation in action. 

' After Steele took possession of Little Rock in the autum of 1863, the Unionists of Arkansas 
held a Convention there, and proceeded to re-estabhsli civil government according to the prescrip- 
tion contained in the President's Amnesty Proclamation. Now the State was so absolutely under 
the control of the Confederates, that the disloyal government called a session of the old Legis- 
lature [September 22, 1864], and elected a representative in the so-called "Senate" of the Con- 
federates, at Richmond. 

^ See page 520. = See note 2, page 666. * See page 6tl. 



688 



THE NATION. 



[18G4. 



East Tennessee a few months longer. At the close of May he went over the 
mountains into Kentucky, and raided through the richest portions of that 
State, well ujj toward the Ohio, for the purpose of drawing Union ti-oops, 
then threatening Southeastern Virginia, in that direction. General Burbridge 
liastened after him, and struck him such blows that his shattered column 
went reeling back into East Tennessee. At Greenville, early in September, 
Morgan was surprised, and was shot dead while trying to escape. Soon after 
this, Breckinridge moved into East Tennessee with a considerable force ; and 
from Kuoxville to the Virginia line, Avas a theater of stirring minor events of 
the war. 

Early in 18G4, there Avere some movements having in view the capture of 
Richmond, and the release of Union prisoners in the Libby, and on more hor- 
rible Belle Isle in the James River. The first of these which attracted much 
iittention, occurred in February, when General B. F. Butler, then in command 
of the Department of Virginia and North Carolina, sent about fifteen hundred 
troops against Richmond. The expedition, owing to treachery, was fruitless. 
Later, General Kilpatrick, with five thousand cavalry, swept around Lee's 

__--^ — =^ — _ . right flank, down to Rich- 

mond, and into its out- 
er line of fortifications 
[March 1, 1864], but was 
compelled to retire. At 
about the same time 
Colonel Dahlgren, with a 
part of Kilpatrick's com- 
mand, appeared before 
Richmond [March 2, 
1864], at another point, 
but was repulsed, and 
while retiring, was killed 
The Confederate authori- 
ties were so exasperated by the audacity of Kilpatrick, that they contemplated 
the summary execution of ninety of Dahlgren's command, who were captured ;' 
and they actually placed gunpowder under Libby Prison for the purpose of 
blowing it up with its hundreds of captive Union soldiers, should they attempt 
to escape !^ A few days later. General Custer, with a considerable force, 

' A Bebfl War Clerk's [J. B. Jones] Diary. March 5, 18G4. The Richmond press, in the 
interest of the Confederates, strongly recommended the measure. "Let them die," said the 
Richmond Whig, not by court-martial, not as prisoners, but as hastes humani generis by general 
order from the President, Commander-in-Chief" 

"^ A Rebel War Clerk's Diary, March 2, 1864. "Last night," says the Diary, "when it was 
supposed probable that the prisoners of war at the Libby might attempt to break out. General 
Winder ordered that a large amount of powder be placed under the building, with instructions to 
blow them up if the attempt were made." Seddon would not give a written order for the diaboli- 
.-al work to be done, but he said, significantly, "the prisoners must not be allowed to escape, 
under any circumstances." "which," says the diarist, "was considered sanction enough. Captain 

obtained an order for and procured several hundred pounds of gunpowder, which was 

placed in readiness. Whether the prisoners were advised of this I know not ; but I told Captain 
it would not be justitiable to spring such a mine in the absence of their knowledge of the 




BELLE ISLE. 



1864.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. QgQ 

threatened Lee's communications in the direction of Charlottesville and the 
Shenandoah Valley. 

We now come to the consideration of one of the great campaigns, planned 
by General Grant, namely, that of the Army of the Potomac under General 
Meade, against the Army of Northern Virginia under General Lee, and Rich- 
mond, the head-quarters of the Conspirators. Grant, as we have seen,' made 
his head-quarters with the Army of the Potomac, which was re-organized, and 
divided into three corps, commanded, respectively, by Generals Hancock, 
Warren, and Sedgwick, and known in the order of the commanders named, as 
the Second, Fifth, and Sixth. General Burnside, who, since his retirement 
from East Tennessee, had been re-organizing his old Ninth Corps, was ordei-ed 
forward, and joined the Army of the Potomac, on the Rapid Anna. Re-enforce- 
ments rapidly filled the armies, and at the close of April [1864], Grant gave 
orders for Meade in Virginia, and Sherman in Northern Georgia, to advance. 

The Army of the Potomac crossed the Rapid Anna, into the tangled region 
known as The Wilderness, on the morning of the 4th of May. At that time 
Lee's army lay strongly intrenched behind Mine Run,* and extending from the 
Rapid Anna almost to Gordonsville. It was also divided into three corps, 
under Ewell, Hill, and Longstreet. Grant intended to move swiftly by Lee's 
flank, masked by The Wilderness, and plant the Union array between that of 
the Confederates and Richmond; but the latter was vigilant, and boldly 
leaving his intrenchments, attacked the Nationals in The Wilderness. A very 
sanguinary battle ensued [May 5 and 6], on that strange battle-field,^ by which 
both armies were shattered, but without any decided advantage gained by 
either. It continued two days, when Lee withdrew behind his intrenchments, 
and Meade prepared to get out of The Wilderness, into the open country near 
Spottsylvania Court-House, as soon as possible. In this sanguinary battle, 
the gallant Union General Wadsworth was killed, and the Confederate General 
Longstreet was wounded. 

General Warren led the movement out of The Wilderness, and Grant's plan 
of flanking Lee would doubtless have been successful, but for delays. When, 
on the morning of the 8th [May, 1864], Warren emerged into the open country 
two or three miles from Spottsylvania Court-House, he found a part of Lee's 
army across his path, in strong position behind intrenchments previously cast 
up, and the remainder rapidly arriving. Before the whole of the Army of the 
Potomac could arrive, that of Northern Virginia was there and ready to 
oppose Grant in flanking movement. Dispositions were made for battle, 

fate awaiting them in the event of their attempting to break out, because such prisoners are not 
to be condemned for striving to regain their liberty. Indeed it is the duty of a prisoner of war to 
escape if he can." 

' See page 68 L " See page 660. 

' Covered with a thick growth of pine, cedars, and shrub-oaks, and tangled under-brush, it 
Was a country in which maneuvering, in the mihtary sense, was almost impossible, and where by 
the compass alone, like mariners at murky midnight, the movements of troops were directed. 
The three hundred guns of the combatants had no avocation there, and the few horsemen not 
away on outward duty were compelled to be almost idle spectators. Of the two hundred thou- 
sand men there ready to fall upon and slay each other, probably no man's eyes saw more than a 
thousand at one time, so absolute was the concealments of the thickets. Never in the history of 
war was such a spectacle exhibited. 

U 



690 



THE NATION. 



[1864 



after some skirmishing on the morning of the 9th, and that day was spent 
in preparations. The gallant Sedgwick was killed while superintending the 
arrangement of a battery. Every thing was in readiness for battle on tlic 
morning of the 10th. It opened vigorously, and raged furiously all day, with 
dreadful losses on both sides. On the following morning [May 11, 1864],^ 
General Grant sent to the government that famous dispatch in which occurred 
his declaration, '•'•I propose to fight it out on this line, if it takes all summer.'''' 

Early on the 12th, another and equally sanguinary contest ensued, when 
Hancock broke through the Confederate lines, gained a great advantage, and 
held it. Another day of terrible fighting ensued, and did not wholly cease 
lantil midnight, when Lee suddenly withdrew behind his second line of intrench- 
ments, and was apparently as strong as ever. In the space of eight days, the 
Army of the Potomac had lost nearly thirty thousand men. Yet Grant, sent a 
cheering dispatch to the government ; and the whole country was listening 
with the deepest anxiety for tidings from the two great armies. Finally, 
Grant determined to turn Lee's present position, and made dispositions accord- 
ingly. Lee proceeded to thwart him, and a severe battle occurred on the 19th 
of May, in which the Nationals were successful in repulsing Lee, but with 
fearful loss to themselves. About forty thousand of the army that crossed the 
Rapid Anna was now disabled. Lee had lost about thirty thousand. 




THE PLACE WHERE SEDGWICK WAS KILLED.' 

When the Army of the Potomac emerged from The Wilderness, General 
Philip H. Sheridan, with a greater portion of the National cavalry, went upon 
a raid on Lee's rear. He SAvept down into the outer line of works before 
Kichmond, fighting and killing on the way, a few miles north of the city, the 
eminent cavalry officer. General J. E. B. Stuart, and destroying the railways 
and a vast amount of public property. He pushed on to the James River below, 
and then returned to the army. In the mean time a co-operating force, under 
General Sigel, in the Shenandoah and KanaAvha Valleys, was active. A part of 

' This is from a sketch made by the author in June, 1 866, taken from the breastworks in front 
of the Union line. Toward the right is seen the logs of the battery, the construction of which 
Sedgwick was superintending, and near which he fell. The bullet came from the clump of tree* 
©n the knoll seen more to the right, on rising ground. 



1864.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION, 



691- 



it under Sigei in person, fought Confederates under Breckinridge, at New 
Market [May 15], when the Nationals were routed. Another part, under 
Generals Crooke and Averill, moved out of the Kanawha Valley, and pro- 
ceeded toward the Virginia Central railway, to destroy it, and also some lead 
mines near Wytheville. But little was accomplished. Later than this. General 
Hunter, who had succeeded Sigel in command, fought [June 5] the Confeder- 
ates at Piedmont, not far from Staunton, where he was joined by Crook and 
Averill. Then the whole body, twenty thousand sti'ong, Avent over the mount- 
ains to capture Lynchburg. It was too strong ; and Hunter, after destroying a 
vast amount of property in that region, withdreAV into West Virginia, and was 
not able to join in the campaign for several weeks afterward. 

While the Army of the Potomac Avas struggling with Lee, General Butler, 
who had been joined by troops, under General Gillmore, which had been called 
up from Charleston, made effective co-operative movements. He went up 
"♦.he James River [May 4, 1864], in armed transports, with about twenty-five 
thousand men, followed by a squadron of gun-boats under Admiral Lee, and 
unarmed transports. Fort Powhatan, Wilson's Landing, and City Point, at 
the mouth of the Appomattox River, were seized, and Butler proceeded at 
once to take possession of and hold the peninsula of Bermuda Hundred between 
the rivers James, and Appomattox. Simultaneously with this movement up 
the James, General Kautz, with five thousand cavalry, w^ent out from Sufiblk, 
to break up the railways south and west of Petersburg ; while Colonel West, 
with fifteen hundred mounted men went up the Peninsula, forded the Chick- 
ahominy, and took post on the James River, opposite City Point. All this was 
done with scarcely any opposition, for Confederate troops were then few in 
that region. 

General Butler proceeded to cast up a strong line of intrenchments across 
the peninsula of Bermuda Hundred, and to destroy the railway between Peters- 
burg and Richmond. The former place was then at his mercy, and might 
have been easily taken, but misinformation from Washington made Butler 
move cautiously. Meanwhile, the withdrawal of Gillmore's troops having 
relieved Charleston of immediate danger, left the Confederate forces there free 
to act elsewhere. So, when Butler moved up the James, Beauregard was 
summoned to Richmond with all the troops he could collect. He passed over 
the Weldon road before Kautz struck it, and filled Petersburg with defenders 
before Butler could move upon it in force. His columns were receiving acces- 
sions of strength every hour, and while Butler was intrenching, Beauregard 
was massing a heavy force on his front along the line of the railway. Finally, 
on the morning of the 16th [May], while a dense fog shrouded the country, he 
attempted to turn Butler's right flank, which was connected with the James by 
a thin line. A National brigade was utterly overwhelmed by the first heavy 
blow, when two regiments, standing firmly at the junction of roads, checked 
the victoi's. At the same time a force that had fallen on Butler's front, was 
repulsed. The assault was renewed, on the National right, when the Union 
troops all fell back to their intrenchments. In this collision the Nationals lost 
about four thousand of their number, and the Confederates, about three thou- 



692 



THE NATION. 



[1864. 



sand. For several days afterward there was some sharp fighting in front of 
Butler's line, Kautz, meanwhile, had been on the railway communications in 
the rear of Petersburg, inflicted considerable but not very serious damage, and 
returned to head-quarters. 

And now Grant's flankmg column was moving grandly forward. Lee had 
the advantage of higher ground, and a more direct road to Richmond, and 
when the Army of the Potomac approached the North Anna River, near the 
Fredericksburg railway crossing, it found its antagonist strongly posted on the 
opposite side, to dispute its passage. A heavy battle ensued [May 23], when 
Lee withdrew a little to a stronger position. Grant became satisfied, after 
careful examination of that position, that he could not carry it. So he with- 
drew [May 2G],and resumed his march on Richmond, well eastward of his foe, 
Sheridan, with the cavalry, in the advance; and on the 28th the entire Army 
of the Potomac was south of the Pamunkey River, with an unobstructed com- 
munication witli its new base of supplies at White House, near the mouth of 
that stream. But Lee, moving by a shorter road, was again in a strongly 
intrenched 2)osition on the National front, covering the turnpike and the two 
railways to Richmond. There heavy battles were fought [May 28, 29], when 
Grant, again finding Lee's position too strong to be carried, began another 

flanking movement, with the intention 
of crossing the Chickahominy near 
Cool Arbor. Sheridan had seized an 
eligible position at Cool Arbor, and 
there, on the following day, the Army 
of the Potomac was re-enforced [May 
31] by ten thousand men under Gen- 
eral W. F. Smith, sent up by Butler 
from the Army of the James at Ber- 
muda Hundred. 

Meade now gave orders for an 
advance upon the foe, and the forcing 
of a passage of the Chickahominy. 
-Here was the old battle-ground where 
McClellan and Lee fought two years 
before, and here were now some san- 
guinary engagements preparatory to the final struggle which occurred on the 
3d of June, when the Army of the Potomac attempted to break through the 
Jines of the Army of Northern Virginia, and cross the Chickahominy. The 
-Struggle w^as feai-ful and bloody, but brief Twenty minutes after the first shot 
was fired, full ten thousand Union men were killed or wounded. The Nationals 
lost no ground, but did not attempt to advance farther. They wei'e attacked 
that night, but repulsed their assailants. Another attack the next day, and 
also at night, had a similar result, but with heavy losses on both sides.' Mean- 




PHILIP H. SHERIDAN. 



' The total loss of the Unionists in the struggle around Cool Arbor, wa? 13,133, of whom 
1,105 were killed. 9.042 wounded, and 2.405 missing. 



18G4.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. (393 

while the Nationals were gradually moving to tlie lett, and on the Ttli [June] 
that wing touched the Chickahominy. Then Sheridan was dispatched Avith 
two divisions of cavalry around Lee's left. He tore up the railways in that 
direction, and scattered all Confederate forces that opposed him until lie reacheJ 
Gordonsville, where he found them so numerous that he retraced his steps. 

Grant now formed the bold resolution to cross the Chickahominy far to 
Lee's right, and then pass the James River and attack Richmond from the 
south. This resolution startled the authorities at Washington Avith fears that 
Lee might turn back and seize that city. Grant had considered all the contin- 
gencies incident to such a bold movement, and feared no evil from it.' To 
this end tht whole army was put in motion [June 12, 13]. The most of the 
troops crossed the Chickahominy at Long Bridge, and moved toward the 
James by way of Charles City Court-House, carrying Avith them the iron work 
of the raihvay between the Chickahominy and White House. The passage of 
the river Avas safely made by the army on ferry-boats and pontoon bridges 011 
the 14th and 15th of June. At the same time unsuccessful efforts Avere made 
by a portion of the Army of the James to seize Petersburg before aid should 
come down to Beauregard from Lee. The failure to do so Avas a sad misfor- 
tune, and from that time, for about ten months, Petersburg and Richmond sus- 
tained a most j^vessing siege. 

General Grant established his head-quarters at City Point, ami thither 
Meade hastened, after posting his army [June 10], to consult lum, when it Avas 
determined to make a general assault that evening on Petersburg. It was done 
by the combined corps of Warren, Hancock, and Burnside, at a heavy cost of 
life, but with the gain of a slight advance of the National line. It Avas evident 
that a greater portion of Lee's army was noAV south of the James River. A 
force under Terry, sent out by Butler to seize and hold the raihvay, Avas driven- 
by Long-street and Pickett. Another general assault Avas ordered on the morn- 
ing of the 18th, AA^hen it Avas found that the Confederates had AvithdraAvn to a 
stronger line of works nearer Petersburg. The attack Avas made in the after- 
noon, and resulted in no gain to the Nationals, but in a heavy loss of men. 

It Avas noAV evident that Petersburg could not be carried by a direct assault, 
so a flanking movement Avas made for the purpose of seizing and cutting the 
Weldon road, and turning the Confederate right. The turning column Avas 
heavily attacked [June 22, 1864] by General A. P. Hill, and Avere falling back, 
Avhen Meade arrived. Then the line Avas restored, and, by an advance at 
nightfall, nearly all of the lost ground Avas recovered. The Weldon road Ava&^ 
reached the next morning, but just as destructive operations upon it ivcre com- 
menced. Hill struck the Nationals a stunning bloAV, Avhich made them recoil- 
In this unsuccessful flank movement, the Unionists lost about four thousand 
men, mostly by capture. At the same time General Wilson, Avith his OAvn and 
Kautz's cavalry, struck the Weldon raihvay at Reams's Station, destroyed tlie 



' The country between Lee's shattered army and "Washington, was thoroughly exhausted by 
the troops that had passed over it, and had Lee attempted such a movement, Grant could have 
sent troops from the James by way of the Potomac for the protection of the capital mtich toouer 
than Lee could have marched to the attack. 



694 



THE NATION. 



[1864. 



buildings and track, and then pushed on to the Lynchburg road. Tliis was 
also destroyed over a distance of twenty-two miles. In the prosecution of this 
^destructive business, the cavalry went on to the Staunton River, when they 
turned, and found themselves compelled to fight their way back. Wearied 
and worn, the shattered column reached the army, with a loss of their guns, 
train, and nearly a thousand men made captive. 

Butler now threw a pontoon bridge across the James River at Deep Bottom, 
over which troops passed and menaced Richmond. Lee sent a force to con- 




PONTOON BRroGE AT DEEP BOTTOM. 

'front them, when Hancock crossed ovei*, flanked the Confederate outpost, and 
^drove them back to the shelter of strong works at Chapin's Bluff, not fat 
Iwlow Fort Darling, on Drewry's Bluff. These Sheridan attempted to flank. 
Lee was so alarmed by these movements within a few miles of Richmond, that 
he withdreAV a large portion of his army from the south side of the river to 
meet the menace, when Grant took the opportunity to make a vigorous attempt 
to carry the Confederate lines before Petersburg. He had secretly run a mine 
under one of their principal forts, in front of Burnside's position, and this was 
sprung oif the morning of the 30th of July. The explosion produced a large 
crater where the fort stood, and by it about three hundred inmates of the work 
perished. At the same moment the National Artillery was opened along the 
whole line, but a simultaneous assault that was to have been made at the point 
of the explosion for the purpose of penetrating the Confederate works, was 
not undertaken in time, and the scheme failed.' 



' Owing to a lack of readiness on the part of the attacking cohimn, the assault was not mado 
;-initil the Confederates had recovered from the shock, and massed troops at the breach. Theso 



1864.1 LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



695 



There was now a brief lull in operations before Petersburg and Richmond, 
during which there were some stirring events in Maryland. When Hunter 
disappeared beyond the mountains,' General Early, who had been sent by Lee 
to drive the former from Lynchburg, hastened to the Shenandoah Valley, and, 
with about fifteen thousand men, swept down to and across the Potomac, driv- 
ing General Sigel into Maryland. Early did not stop to molest some of Sigel's 
command on Maryland Heights at Harper's Ferry, but pushed on to Hagers- 
town and Frederick. His Avas a powerful raid, for the purposes of plunder 
and a possible seizure of Baltimore and Washington, but chiefly to cause 
Grant to send heavy bodies of troops for the defense of tlio latter city, and so 
compel liim to raise the siege of Petersburg. 

At that time the only force at hand to confront Early were a few troops 
commanded by General Lewis Wallace, whose head-quarters were at Baltimore. 
That energetic officer proceeded at once to a judicious use of the small force 
under his control, in which he was ably seconded by the gallant General E. B. 
Tyler. On hearing of Early's movement, General Grant had sent the Sixth 
Corps, under General Wright, to Washington, and, fortunately, the Nineteenth 
Corps, under General Emory," arrived at this juncture at Fortress Monroe, from 
New Orleans. The division of General Ricketts, of that corps, was imme- 
diately sent to Baltimore, and with these, and such troops as he could gather 
in his department, Wallace made a stand behind the Monocacy River, not far 
from Frederick. There, with his handful of men, he fought Early [July 9, 
1864], whose cavalry were making demonstrations on his flanks. Wallace was 
compelled to fall back on Baltimore after heavy loss.^ Then Eaiiy pushed on 
toward Washington, but the check and lesson given him by Wallace so 
retarded his movements that the Sixth and Nineteenth Corps arrived there in 
time to save the city from captui-e. Early withdrew from in front of Wash- 
ington on the night of the 12th, and with much booty crossed the Potomac 
into Virginia at Edwards's Ferry. General Wright pursued him through 
Snickers Gap to the Shenandoah River, where, after a sharp conflict [July 19], 
Early began a retreat up the Valley, and Wright returned to Washington. 
Threatenings in that valley caused both the Sixth and Nineteenth Corps to be 
quickly sent there, and soon afterward occurred Sheridan's brilliant campaign 
in that region, which will be noticed presently. 

A fortnight after the failure of the mining operations at Petersburg, Grant 
sent another expedition to the north side of the James, at Deep Bottom, com- 
posed of the divisions of Birney and Hancock, and cavalry under Gregg. As 
before, Richmond was seriously threatened, but in engagements on the 13th 
and 16th of August, no decided advantage to the Unionists was gained, except- 
ing the incidental one of assisting similar demonstrations on the right of the 
Confederates, against which Warren was impelled, for the purpose of seizing 



repulsed the assaulting column when it moved forward, and inflicted a loss on the Unionists of 

about 4,400 men. 

• See page 691. 'See page 684 

» He lost nearly two thousand men, including 1,282 who were made prisoners, or were other- 

ivise missing. His killed numbered 98, and his wounded 57^ 



696 



THE NATION. 



[1864. 



the Weldon road. Tliis he eftected [August 18], with a loss of a thousand 
men. There he commenced intrenching, when a stronger force than he had 
encountered endeavored to regain the road. In so doing they temporarily- 
broke [August 19] Warren's line, and captured twenty-five hundred of his 
men, including General J. Hayes. But the Nationals held the road in spite of 
all efforts to dislodge them. They repulsed another heavy attack on the 21st, 
and on the same day Hancock, who had returned from the north side of the 
James, struck the Weldon road at Reams's Station, and destroyed the track 
for some distance. The Confederates attacked them in heavy force, when they 
were most gallantly opposed by Miles and others. The Nationals Avere finally 
driven off after a loss of 2,400 men out of 8,000 men ; also five guns. 

For a month after this there was comparative quiet along the lines, when 
National troops moved simultaneously upon the right and left flanks of the Con- 
federates, That of Warren, on their right, was more for the purpose of mask- 
ing a more formidable one by Butler on their left, on the north side of the 
James, with the Tenth Corps, under Birney, and Eighteenth, under Ord. 
Warren gained some advantage by pushing forward the National lines, but 
that gained by Butler was of far more importance. He stormed and captured 
their strongest Avork [September 29, 1864] on 
that side of the river, known as Fort Harrison, 
with fifteen guns and a line of intrenchments. 
In an attack upon another fort near, immediate- 
ly afterward, the Nationals were repulsed, and 
General Burnham was killed. The gallant 
behavior of colored troops in this charge was 
such that General Butler, after the war, caused 
a number of silver medals to be struck and 
given to the most distinguished among them, 
in testimony of their valor on that occasion. 
Now there was another pause for a month, 
when an attempt was 
made to turn the Con- 
federate right, while 
Butler menaced their 
left on the north side 
of the James River. 
The bulk of the Army 
of the Potomac was 
massed on Lee's right, 
and moved [October 
27] upon his Avorks on 
Hatcher's Run, west 
of the Weldon road. 
For that position there Avas a severe struggle, which resulted in a repulse of 
the Natioiials, and theii final Avi.hdraAval [Occober 29] to their intreachments 
in front of Petersburg From that time until the opening of the spring cam- 




THE BUTLER MEDAL. 



1864.] 



LIXCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



69r 



paign, little was done by the Nationals inimediately in front of Petersburg and 
Richmond, excepting an extension of their line to Hatcher's Run. Up to the 
first of November, from the fifth of May, the losses of the Array of the Potomac 
had been fearful — a little more than 88,000 men. Probably the entire loss 
among troops engaged in the campaign against Richmond during that time 
was 100,000 men. 

In the mean time there had been stirring events in the Shenandoah Valley. 
On the day after Wright and Early fought,' Averill, moving up from Martins- 
burg, had a contest with and worsted a Confederate force near Winchester 
[July 20], taking prisoners and guns. Two or three days afterward, Crook 
was driven back from that neighborhood by a strong attacking party, and it 
was evident that Early had not, as was expected, hastened to rejoin Lee, but 
was in full force in the Valley, and ready to fight. His own estimate of his 
])Ower was eviiiced by his sending General McCausland and others on a raid 
into Maryland and Western Pennsylvania, at which time they burned about 
two-thirds of the city of Chambersburg. When the raiders turned again 
toward the Potomac, Averill, who was in the vicinity of Chambersburg, fol- 
lowed, but they Avent back to Virginia with plunder, without much molesta- 
tion. 

When information of this daring raid reached Washington, the Sixth unit 
Ninth Corps were sent first in quest of the invaders, and then into the Shenan- 




VIEW AT CEDAR CREEK. 



doah Valley, where they were joined by Hunters troops. The whole force. 
about 30,000 strong, was placed under the command of General Sheridan early 
in August. After a month's preparation, he assumed the offensive against 
Early, and by a series of brilliant movements and a sharp battle, he sent him 



698 



THE NATION. 



[1864. 



" whirling up the Valley," as he expressed it. First there was a severe battle 
near Winchester [Sept. 19], when Early retreated to the strong position of 
Fisher's Hill, not far from Strasburg. He was driven from this vantage 
ground on the 21st, with heavy loss, and fled to the mountains with not more 
than half his army with which he had at first met Sheridan. The latter fell 
back to a position behind Cedar Creek, near Strasburg, where, on the 19th of 
October, Early, who had been re-enforced, and had come down to Fisher's 
Hill, fell suddenly and crushingly upon the Nationals, and came near over- 
whelming them with destruction. They fell back to Middletown and beyond, 
where, under the chief direction of General Wright, they turned upon their 
pursuers. Sheridan had just come up from Winchester, A sharp conflict 
-ensued, when the tide was turned, and Early was again sent in swift retreat up 
the Shenandoah Valley, with heavy loss, Sheridan's short campaign in the 
Valley was a brilliant success, and ended hostilities in that region, for he nearly 
annihilated Early's army, and Lee could spare no more men for warfare away 
irom Richmond. 



CHAPTER XIX. 



THE CIVIL WAR. [1861—1865,] 

Let us here turn from a consideration of the campaign against Richmond, 
and its defenders, for awhile, and observe the progress of that against Atlanta 
and the army that stood in the way of the National advance. General William 
T. Sherman was chosen by Grant, to lead the troops in the campaign in 

Georgia, and he set out from the 
vicinity of Chattanooga, at the be- 
ginning of May, with nearly 100,000 
men.' His antagonist. General Joseph 
E, Johnston, then at Dalton, had 
about 55,000 men,^ Johnston was in 
a strong position at Dalton, the ap- 
proaches to it, through gaps in a 
mountain range, being strongly forti- 
fied, Sherman, when he moved for- 
ward, was satisfied that a direct 
attack on Johnston's front, through 
Buzzard's Roost Pass in Rocky Face 
Ridge, would be disastrous to his 
men, so he began that series of mas- 

' Sherman was the commander of the Military Division of the Missisippi, which Grant held at 
the time of his promotion. His force for the campaign comprised three armies, namely : Army 
of the Cumberland, led by General George H. Thomas, 60,773 ; Army of the Tennessee, General 
McPherson. 24,465; and Army of the Ohio, General Schofield. 13,559; total, 98,797. 

* Johnston's army was divided into three corps, commanded respectively by Generals Hardee, 
Hood, and Folk. 




18G4.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. ^99 

terly flank movements by which he compelled his adversary (who was deter- 
mined to save his army), to abandon one strong position after another. 

Sherman menaced Johnston on front and flank, on the Vth of May, when 
the latter abandoned his position at Dalton, and fell back behind strong works 
at Resaca, which extended from the Oostenaula River, northward. When 
Sherman approached, Johnston sent out troops to attack a portion of his com- 
mand. A sharp fight occurred [May 15], about two miles from Resaca Station, 
in which the Confederates were driven, and retreated, across the Oostenaula 
covered by the corps of Hardee. The Nationals closely pursued, Thomas 
following directly in the rear of the fugitives, while McPherson and Schofield 
took routes to their right and left. General J. C. Davis and his division pushed 
on to Rome, where they destroyed mills and founderies of great importance. 
Near Adairsville, Johnston made a brief stand against the central pursuing 
column, but on the near approach of the Nationals, he continued his retreat to 
a strong and fortified position at Cassville. There he evidently intended to 
give battle, but he thought it prudent to move on [May 1 9], when he crossed 
the Etowah River, burnt the bridges behind him, and took another good 
position covering the Allatoona Pass, in a mountainous region. 

Sherman now rested his army a little. He perceived that Johnston's posi- 
tion was almost impregnable, so he determined to flank him out of it, by 
moving well to the right, and concentrating his army at Dallas. Johnston 
attempted to thwart the movement, and in that vicinity a severe but indecisive 
battle was fought [May 25], Johnston's army, meanwhile, had been very 
busy in casting up inti-enchments between Dallas and Marietta, over a broken 
Avooded region, in which it was very difticult for troops to operate. In that 
region much skirmishing and fighting occurred, and finally, on the first of June, 
Johnston was compelled to evacuate the Allatoona Pass. He also, soon after- 
ward, abandoned his intrenchments near New Hope Church and Ackworth. 
Sherman now garrisoned Allatoona Pass, and made it a secondary base of sup- 
plies, he having caused the railway and its bridges between there and Chatta- 
nooga to be put in order. He was now re-enforced by infantry, and cavalry, 
making his army nearly as strong as when it left Chattanooga ; and he moved 
forward [June 9] to Big Shanty, not far from the great Kenesaw Mountain, 
around and upon w^hich, as well as upon Lost Mountain and Pine Mountain, 
the Confederates had lines of intrenchments. 

In this region there was much maneuvering and fighting, for a few days, 
in the midst of almost incessant rain, during which General (Bishop) Polk was 
killed. By persistent assaults, Sherman compelled Johnston to abandon, first, 
Pine Mountain [June 15], then Lost Mountain [June 17]; and finally, after 
some sanguinary engagements, in which both parties suffered terribly, he was 
compelled to evacuate the great Kenesaw Mountain [July 2], overlooking 
Marietta. At dawn on the 3d, the National banner was seen waving over that 
peak, and at eight o'clock in the morning Sherman rode into Marietta, close 
upon the rear guard of Johnston's army, then hastening to the Chattahoochee 
River, near Atlanta, closely pursued by the Nationals. Sherman hoped to 
strike Johnson a fatal blow while he was crossing that stream, but that skillful 



roo 



T H E NATION 



[1864. 



leader so quickly covered the j^assage by strong iiitrenchments, that his army 
■was all across, excepting troops holding the works, early on the morning of 
the 5th, without having been molested. 




SUMMIT OF GREAT KENESAW MOUXTAIN.' 



Sherman pi-om])tly advanced to the Chattahoochee, where quick and success- 
ful turning movements by Schofield and Howard, caused Johnston to abandon 
the line of the river, and retreat toward Atlanta [July 10, 1864]. He formed 
a new line, covei-ing that town, with the Chattahoochee on his left, and Peach- 
tree Creek on his right. Now the two armies rested a little ; and at that time 

Johnston Avas relived of command, 
and General J. B. Hood, of Texas, was 
appointed to fill his place. The former 
had been careful to preserve his army. 
His force was every way inferior to 
that of his antagonist, and he knew 
that in pitched battles he Avould doubt- 
less lose a large portion of his men 
and materials. The '^government" at 
Richmond were dissatisfied w^ith his 
wise caution, and committed his army 
I to a dashing and brave soldier, who 
preferred the quick work of brute force 
to the slower achievements of mili- 
tary science. Hood received from 
Johnston full fifty thousand effective 
With these he resolved to fight, and not 




J. B. HOOD. 



men, of whom 10,000 were cavalry, 
retreat. 

On the 16th of July, General Rousseau joined Sherman with 2,000 cavalry; 



' This is from a sketch made by the author in May, 1866. The high peak in tlie distance is 
Lost Mountain. The eminence on the extreme right is Pine Mountain, on which General Polk 
i\'as killed while watching the movements of troops. 



1864.] LIXCOLX'S ADMINISTRATION. fjQi 

and on the 19tli such of tlie National forces as had not crossed the Chatta- 
lioochee, passed over it. Then the left, led by Schofield and McPherson, 
advanced with the intention of striking the railway east of Decatur, that 
connects Atlanta with Augusta. Thomas, at the same time, crossed Peach-tree 
Creek at several places, and heavy skirmishing occurred along the entire front 
of the advancing columns. McPherson struck and destroyed the railway for 
several miles, and Schofield reached Decatur. Hood had determined to give 
battle at an auspicious moment, and on the afternoon of the 20th he fell 
heavily upon the corps of Howard and Hooker, and a part of Palmer's, but 
was repulsed after a most gallant struggle, in which both sides suffered 
severely.' 

On the morning of the 22d [July, 1864], Sherman discovered tliat the Con- 
federates had abandoned the heights along Peach-tree Creek, and it was con- 
cluded that Hood, following the example of Johnston, was about to evacuate 
Atlanta. The army was at once moved rapidly toward that city, when, at an 
average of two miles from it, it encountered a very heavy line of intrencli- 
ments, which had been cast up the previous year, with Hood and his army 
behind them. General Blair, commanding the Seventeentli Corps, had carried 
an important point the night before, and was in full view of the city, and 
preparations were made for assailing the Confederate lines in heavy force, 
when they were compelled to perform less acceptable service. Hood had 
l>cen holding the Nationals in check with a small part of his army, and had 
made a long night march around with his main body, and now he fell with 
crushing force upon Sherman's rear. The first assault was made by Hardee ; 
and at about the same time, McPherson, who was riding about alone in the 
woods, and in fancied safety, making observations, was shot dead, whei» 
General Logan succeeded to the command of his troops. A terrible battle, 
that lasted for hours, succeeded Hardee's assault, when, toward evening, the 
Confederates, who had lost very heavily, unable to carry the coveted points, 
desisted. The assault was soon renewed, and after another desperate struggle, 
the Nationals were victorious, and the Confederates retired to their works.- 

Hood now seemed more disposed to be quiet, and Sherman dispatched 
cavalry to make raids on the railways in the rear of his antagonist. Generals 
E, M. McCook and Stoneman were sent on this business, on different routes, 
but with the intention of co-operating. Failing in this, their operations, 
though important, fell short of Sherman's expectations, Stoneman effected 
very little, and his force, divided and weakened, was captured or dispersed, 
and himself made prisoner. Meanwhile Sherman made dispositions for flanking 
Hood out of Atlanta, when the latter attacked the Nationals [July 28], and a 
sanguinary battle ensued. Hood Avas repulsed with heavy loss, and soon 
perceiving that Sherman was gradually getting possession of the railroads by 

' The Union loss, mostly of Howard's corps, was about 1,500 men. Sherman estimated the 
Confederate loss at 5,000. They left 500 dead, and 1,000 severely wounded, on the field, besides 
many prisoners. 

•' The National loss in the struggles of that day was 3,722, of whom about 1,000 were pnsoners. 
Sherman estimated Hood's total loss at not less than 8,000. He left 2,200 dead on the field, 
within the Union lines, and 1,000 prisoners. 



f^()2 '^^^ NATION. [1S64. 

Avliich the Confederates in Atlanta received their supplies, he sent his cavalry 
to retaliate in kind, by striking Sherman's communications. This absence of 
Hood's cavalry gave Sherman a coveted opportunity to harm his antagonist 
seriously. He dispatched Kilpatrick at the middle of August with 5,000 
liorsemen, to break up the railways leading, one tOAvard Montgomery, in 
Alabama, and the other to Macon, in Georgia. This raid was successful, and 
was followed by a movement of nearly the whole army from Atlanta to the 
railways in its rear, when Hood, fatally dividing his army, sent a part under 
Hardee, to fight Howard at Jonesboro', twenty miles south, on the Macon 
road, while he, with the remainder, staid at Atlanta. There was a desperate 
battle at Jonesboro' [August 31], in which the Nationals w^ere victorious. 
Howard lost about 500 men, and Hardee 2,500. The Confederate works 
covering Jonesboro' were captured, and Hardee retreated. ~ 

On bearing of the disaster at Jonesboro', Hood blew up his magazines at 

^ ^^ _ Atlanta, and fled to a point of junction 

^^ ,^ with Hardee, Sherman took possession 

=r ^^Z=S^ of the city and fortifications, and found 

^ that Hood had not only left the place 
desolate by the destruction of factories, 
founderies, and other industrial establish- 
ments, but had left scarcely any food for 
the inhabitants. It was impossible for 
Sherman to subsist both them and his 
army, so he humanely ordered them to 
leave for the North or the South, as their 
inclinations might lead them.' 
, While Sherman was resting his army 

SHERMAN'S HEAD-QUARTERS IN ATLANTA. ^^ - _ , ^ . . •' 

at Atlanta, Hood flanked his right, 
crossed the Chattahoochee, and made a raid upon his communications. With 
a strong force he threatened Sherman's supplies at Allatoona Pass, then lightly 
guarded, but Gei^eral Corse hastening up from Rome assisted in saving them. 
Not doubting it to be Hood's intention to push up into Tennessee, Sherman 
sent Thomas to Nashville, so soon as he heard of Hood's flank movements ; 
and leaving Slocum (who had succeeded Hooker) in command at Atlanta, he 
pushed the bulk of his array in the direction of Allatoona Pass, and from the 
top of Great Kenesaw, told Corse, by signal, that help Avas near, and to hold 
out until it should reach him. The Confederates were repulsed, and then 
Hood moved northward, threatening posts along the line of the railway, under 
instructions, to entice his adversary out of Georgia. Sherman closely followed 
him, well up toward Chattanooga, when the route of the chase deflected 
westward. In Northern Alabama, Sherman relinquished it, and sending 
Schofield, and most of his cavalry, under Wilson, to Thomas at Nashville, he 
returned to Atlanta, taking with him the garrisons of posts, dismantling the 

' In government wagons, and at the cost of the government, over 2,000 persons with much 
furniture and clothing were carried south as far as Rough and Ready, and those who desired to 
go north, were kindly taken to Chattanooga. 




1864.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



705 



railway, and burning founderies, &c. He cut loose from all liis cAnmuni- 
cations on the north, and prepared for a march to the sea. 

Sherman's great march to the sea was begun, with 65,000 men of all arms, 
on the nth of November, 1864, on which day he cut his telegraphic communi- 
cations with the North, and was not heard from for some time, excepting 
through Confederate newspapers. His army moved in two grand divisions, 
the right led by General O. O. Howard, and the left by General H. W. Slocum. 
General Kilpatrick led, Avith 5,000 cavalry. Much of Atlanta was destroyed 
before they left it, and the railways and public property were made desolate in 
the track of the two heavy columns. Wheeler's cavalry afforded the chief 
annoyance to the army on its march. Feints Avere made here and there, to 
distract the Confederates, and were successful. The destination of the 
Nationals from the beginning, had been Savannah or its vicinity, but the 
foe sometimes thought it was Augusta, and then Milledgeville. They passed 
on, and on the 13th of December, [1864], General Hazen captured Fort 
McAllister, on the Ogeechee River, not far from Savannah. That city was 
immediately invested, and on the night -- — — 

of the 20th, Hardee, in command there 
with 15,000 troops, evacuated it, and 
fled to Charleston, after destroying much 
public property. On the following day 
the National troops took possession of 
Savannah,' and there rested. The army 
had marched two hundred and fifty-five 
miles in the space of six weeks, inflicting 
much injury on the Confederates, but 
receiving very little injury in return.^ 
As Sherman approached the coast. Gen- 
eral Foster, commanding in that region, 
made valuable co-operative movements ; 
and when Hardee fled to Charleston, he occupied strong positions on the rail- 
way between the two cities, at Pocotaligo, and other places. 

There were some stirring scenes in 1864, in the region of the Atlantic 
coast between the Pamlico and St. John's rivers, Avhich had passed into history 
when Sherman reached the estuaries of the sea at the close of that year. "We 
left Gillmore easily holding Charleston Avith a tight grasp at the close of 1863.* 
Information had then reached him, and the government, that Florida Avas 
ready to step back into the Union, through the open door of amnesty, but 
needed a military escort, for there Avere some active Confederate troops, under 




SHERMAN S HEAD-QUARTEKS IN SAVANNAH. 



' Sherman, in a dispatch to the President, said : "I beg to present yon, as a Christmas gift, the 
city of Savannah, with 150 heavy guns, and plenty of ammunition, and also about 25,000 bales of 
cotton. 

" Sherman lost during the march, 567 men, whereof only 63 were killed. He captured 1,323 
men, and 167 guns. He found and used ample subsistence on the route, amounting, in the 
aggregate, to 13,000 beeves, 160,000 bushels of com, and over 5,000 tons of fodder; also 5,000 
horses, and 4,000 mules. He burned about 20,000 bales of cotton, and captured 25,000 bales, at 
Savannah. ' See page 675, 



704 Tf^^ NATION. [1864. 

General Finnegan, yot Avitbin her borders. General GiUmore accordingly sent 
General Truman Seymour, witb about six thousand troops, horse and foot, to 
assist in the restoration of Florida to the Union.' He entered the St. John's 
River on a fleet of steamers and sailing vessels, with an imposing display, and 
on the 7th of February, took possession of the ruined city of Jacksonville, 
from which Finnegan had fled on Seymour's approach. 

Finnegan was immediately pursued. Colonel Henry, with cavalry, leading 
in the chase. He dro^-e the Confederates from place to place, capturing their 
guns, their stores, and men, and was closely followed by Seymour with the 
residue of the ai'my. Finally, Seymour concentrated his forces at Sanderson, 
and, Avith about five thousand men, moved toward the Suwannee River. At 
Olustee Station, where the railway that crosses the peninsula passes through a 
cypress swamp, he encountered Finnegan [February 20, 1864], in a strong 
position, and in a severe battle that ensued, was repulsed. He retreated to 
Jacksonville in good order, burning, on the way, stores valued at $1,000,000. 
In that unfortunate expedition Seymour lost about two thousand men. 

At about that time Rear-Admiral Bailey destroyed important salt-works, 
on the Florida coast, which were valued at $3,000,000. There were some 
raids in Florida in the course of the summer, but after the battle at Olustee, 
very little was done toward the restoration of Florida to its place in the 
Union.' In Georgia, Sherman's invasion wa'fe absorbing all interest. In South 
Carolina, very little of importance, bearing upon the progress of the war, was 
accomplished.' There were some unsuccessful offensive movements in the 
vicinity of Charleston. Gillmore's guns kept watch and ward over the harbor 
and city, while he and some of his troops went np the James, to assist in 
operations against Petersburg, and Richmond, as we have seen.^ 

There were some events a little more stirring, in North Carolina, early in 
1864. On the first of February, a Confederate force under General Pickett, 
menaced New Berne, and destroyed a fine gun-boat lying there. A few weeks 
later. General Hoke marched seven thousand men against Plymouth [April 17, 

>1864], neai^the mouth 
of the Roanoke River, 
where General Wessells 
was in command of a 
garrison of about twen- 
ty-four hundred men, 
with some fortifica- 
tions. A formidable 
" ram," called the Al- 
bemarle, lying in the 
Roanoke, assisted in the attack, and on the 20th, Wessells was compelled to 

' The President commissioned, John Hay, one of his private secretaries, as major, and sent him 
[January 1 3], to Hilton Head, for the purpose of accompanying the expedition, to act in a civil 
capacity, if circumstances should require him to. 

* On the 20th of May there was a Union Convention, at Jacksonville, to take measures for the 
restoration of civil authority in Florida. No practical advantage resulted from the gathering. 

* See page G91. 




THE ALBEMARLE. 



1864.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 7()5 

■sun-ender tlie jilaee, Avitli sixteen liuudred men, twenty-five gixns, and a large 
quantity of small-arms and stores. After the fall of Plymouth, General Palmer 
abandoned [April 28] Washington, at the head of Pamlico Sound, and 
Hoke summoned New Berne to surrender, expecting the co-operation of the 
Albemarle in a siege. She was enticed from her safe anchorage under the 
guns at Plymouth, and after a severe fight with the Sassacus, was compelled 
to flee for safety up the Roanoke. The siege of New Berne was abandoned, 
and Iloke was called to the James River. Several months later, the gallant 
Lieutenant Gushing, of the navy, destroyed [October 27], the dreaded Albe- 
viarle with a torpedo, in the Roanoke. Four days afterward, the National 
troops re-entered Plymouth. After that the war in that region consisted 
chiefly of a series of encounters between Union raiders and detachments of 
Confederates. 

When Sherman sent Thomas to Nashville, he gave him the widest dis- 
cretionary poAvers. These were used with gi-eat judgment, and Thomas pre- 
pared for the stirring events Avhich soon followed, with wise skill. Hood, as 
Sherman had anticipated, pushed across the Tennessee River, Forrest's cavalry 
heralding his advance. That active leader went raiding up the railway that 
leads from Decatur to Nashville, when he was met at Pulaski by Rousseau, 
and compelled to turn eastward to the Ghattanooga road. Rousseau again 
confronted him at TuUahoma. At the same time General Steedraan was 
marching against him in considerable force from another direction. Forrest 
eluded them, and for awhile, in September and October [1864], there were 
:stirring scenes between the Tennessee and Duck rivers, for several detach- 
ments of National troops were vainly endeavoring to catch the bold raiders. 
At length, late in October, Hood appeared near Decatur, in Northern Alabama, 
then held by General Gordon Granger. He menaced that post, but only as a 
mask to the passage of his army over the Tennessee, near Florence. Forrest 
was again on the war-path, co-operating with Hood, and caused the destruc- 
tion, at Johnsonville, on the Tennessee River, of National stores and other 
property, valued at |1, 500,000. 

Hood had been re-enforced by a part of Dick Taylor's army, and he now 
pressed vigorously nortliward with more than 50,000 men, a large number of 
them natives of Tennessee and Kentucky. Thomas had about 30,000 imJ2> 
diately available troops, with nearly as many more scattered over Tennessee 
and Northern Alabama. He sent troops forward to impede rather than pre- 
vent Hood's march on Nashville, and was successful. Schofield, with a strong 
force at Pulaski, fell back, as Hood advanced, across Duck River, with his 
train ; and at Columbia he kept the Confederates on the south side of that 
stream until his wagons were well on toward Franklin, where he took a posi- 
tion on the 30th of November, and, casting up intrenchments, prepared to 
fight, if necessary, until his trains should be safely on their way to Nashville. 
Hood came up in the afternoon, and attempted to crush his opponent by the 
mere weight of numbers. A most desperate struggle ensued. At the first 
onset the Confederates drove the whole Nationalline, capturing the works and 
guns, and gaining, apparently, a complete victory. A counter charge was 

45 



706 



THE NATION. 



[1864. 



made, when the Confederates were driven out of the captured works, the o-uns 
wei-e recovered, ten flags and three Imndred men were captured from the 
assailants, and the National line was restored, chiefly through the skill and 



ixSS^ 




VIEW ON THE BATTLE-GEOUND AT FRANKLIN. 

bravery of General Opdyke, directing gallant soldiers. Hood made desperate 
but unavailing attempts to retake the works, and the battle raged until 
toward midnight. Hood's loss was terrible — at least one-sixth of his effective 
force.' 

Schofield now fell back to Nashville, carrying with him all of his guns, 
when Hood advanced and invested that post with about 40,000 men. Thomas 
had been re-enforced by General A. J. Smith's troops, which had just come 
from assisting in chasing Price out of Missouri.^ Thomas's infantry was fully 
equal in numbers to those of his adversary, but he was deficient in cavalry. 
Rousseau was in Fort Rosecrans, at Murfreesboro', to hold the railway to 
Chattanooga, and Thomas allowed Hood to remain in front of him as long as 
possible, so as to give himself time to increase his own supply q£ horses and 
obtain means for transportation. Finally, on the 15th of December, Thomas 
moved out upon Hood, The battle was opened by the Fourth Corps, under 
General T. J. Wood. The Confederates Avere driven out of their works, and 
pressed back to the foot of the Harj^eth hills with a loss of 1 ,200 prisoners and 
16 guns. "Wood again advanced the next day [Dec. 16, 1864], and Avith other 
troops, after a severe battle, drove the Confederates through the Brentwood 
Pass. They left behind them most of their guns, and a large number of their 
companions as prisoners.* They were hotly pursued for several days. Hood 
turning occasionally to fight. Forrest joined him at Columbia, and formed a 
covering party ; and at near the close of the month Hood escaped across the 
Tennessee River with his shattered columns. So ended, in complete victory 



' The Confederate loss was reported by General Thomas at 6,252, of wliom 1,150 were killed. 
The National loss was 2,326, whereof 189 were killed. Nearly 1,000 were captured. 

■•^ See page 687. 

^ In the two days' battles, Thomas captured 4,462 prisoners, of whom 287 were officers, one 
of them a major-general ; also fifty-three guns and many small-arms. 



1864] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. ^Q'^ 

for the Nationals, Thomas's admirably managed campaign in Tennessee.* 
Hood's army had now ceased to be formidable in numbers or spirit, and at 
Tupelo, in Mississippi, that commander was relieved, at his own request, on 
the 23d of January, 1865, and was succeeded by Beauregard. 

Let us now turn a moment from the consideration of the struggle on the 
land, to some events of the war on the ocean. We have already noticed the 
pirate ship Alabama^ commanded by Raphael Semmes. The same man had 
previously commanded the pirate ship Sumter, Avhich, after a brief but destruct- 
ive career on the ocean, was blockaded by the ship-of-war Ttiscarora at Gibral- 
tar, and there sold early in 1862. A superior cruiser, built for the Conspirators, 
in England, called the Florida, afterward roamed the sea in charge of J. N. 
Maffit. Also the Georgia, built in Great Britain, and sailing under British 
colors. These freebooters captured and destroyed scores of ships, and cargoes 
valued at many millions of dollars ; and they drove at least two-thirds of the 
carrying trade between the United States and Europe into British bottoms. 
They were heartily welcomed into all British ports ; and the remonstrances of 
the American Minister in London against the building, fitting out, and encour- 
agement of these marauders, as we have seen,^ were of no avail. Three others 
were added by British shipmasters in 1864 [Tallahassee, Olustee, and Chickor 
mauga), whose ravages quickly swelled the sum total of damage inflicted 
upon American commerce by Anglo-rebel pirates.^ 

The new cruisers were equally destructive, and great eSbrts were made to 
capture them. The Georgia was seized off the port of Lisbon in August 
[1864], by the Niagara, Captain Craven; and on the Yth of October, the 
Wachicsetts, Captain Collins, captured the Florida in a Brazilian port.^ The 



1 Thomas had sent Stoneman from his army, and Burbridge from Eastern Kentucky, in No- 
vember, to confront Breckinridge in East Tennessee. They drove him out of that region, and 
captured Abingdon, in Virginia, where they destroyed a large quantity of Confederate stores. In 
these movements there had been severe skirmishes. These were continued. The Confederate 
cavalry was commanded by General Yaughan, and these were repeatedly attacked by General 
Gillem in that mountain region. Stoneman, who had been followed in his advance on "Wytheville, 
by Breckinridge, turned upon him at Marion, when the latter fled over the mountains into North 
Carolina. East Tennessee was now entirely cleared of Confederate troops. 

General Thomas reported that during his campaign, from September 7, 1864, to January 20, 
1865, when all was quiet in the region of his command, he had captured, including officers, 
11,587 prisoners, besides 1,332, who "had been exchanged. He had also administered the oath 
of allegiance to 2,207 deserters from the Confederate armies, and captured 72 serviceable guns 
and 3,079 small-arms. His total loss during the campaign was about ten thousand men, which 
he estimated to be less than half that of the enemy. 

* See page 641, and note 5, same page. 

' See note 4, page 641. . 

* At the beginning of 1864 the pirates then on the ocean had captured 193 American merchant 
ships, whereof all but 17 were burnt. The value of their cargoes, in the aggregate, was esti- 
mated at $13,445,000. So dangerous became the navigation of the ocean for American vessels, 
that about 1,000 of them were sold to foreign merchants, chiefly British. . <. .. 

* This act the Secretary of State disavowed in behah"of our government, on the ground ot the 
unlawfulness of any unauthorized exercise of force by this country within a Brazilian harbor. 
At the same time, whUe making this reparation, he declared that Brazil justly owed reparation 
to the United States for harboring the pirate. On that point ho said that the government main- 
tained that the Florida, "like the Alabama, was a pirate, belonging to no nation or lawful be yjerent 
and. therefore, the harboring and supplving of these piratical ships and their crews, in belligerent 
ports, were wrongs and injuries for which Brazil justly owes reparation to the United States, as 
ample as the reparation she now receives from them." 



708 



X A T I X . 



[1864. 




JOHN A. WINSLOW. 



Alabama had already been sent to the bottom of the sea by the Kearsarge^ 
Captain Winslow, off the French port of Cherbourg, whei'e the two vessels 

had a combat on Sunday, the 1 9th of 
June. After a mutual cannonade for 
an hour, the Alabama was disabled 
and in a sinking condition, when she 
struck her flag, and in twenty minutes 
went down. The Alabama had a 
British tender near, named the Deer- 
hound, which was active in rescuhig 
Semmes and his officers, so that tiiey 
might not be captured and become 
prisoners of war.' The "common 
people" of the ship were rescued by 
•the Kearsarge and a French vessel. 

Soon after the destruction of the Ala- 
bama, measures were taken for further 
diminishing the aid continually given to the Confederates by British vessels, 
by closing, against the blockade-runners, the ports of Mobile and Wilmington, 
the only ones now remain- _^ ^^ 

ing open to them. These ^fc?" ^ — J^Z-^ 

having double entrances, 
made it difficult for block- 
ading squadrons to pre- 
vent the swift, light-draft 
blockade-runners, from 
slipping in with valuable 
cargoes of supplies, and 
slipping out with cargoes 
of cotton.^ It Avas re- 
solved to seal up Mobile 
first, and for that purpose 
Admiral Farragut appeared [August 5, 1864] off the entrance of Mobile Bay, 
with a fleet of eighteen vessels, four of them iron-clad, while a land force, sent 
from New Orleans, under General Gordon Granger, was planted upon Dauphin 




BLOCKADE-RUNNEB. 



1 The Deerhound was a yacht belonging to one of the British aristocracy, named Lancaster, 
■who was in her, and watched with eagerness the fight between his friend Semmes and Winslow. 
It appears clear that he was there by previous arrangement, to afford the pirate any needed assist- 
ance in his power, and especially, in the event of disaster, to keep him out of the hands of 
the victor. This was done. He carried Semmes and his officers to England. At Southamp- 
ton a public dinner was offered to Semmes ; and a British admiral (Anson) headed a list of 
subscribers to a fund raised for the purpose of purchasing an elegant sword to present to the 
corsair. 

^ These vessels were generally painted a light gray, so that it was not easy to discern them 
in a fog, or the light haze that often lay upon the waters around the seaports. They were built 
for speed, with raking smoke-stacks, and were generally more nimble m a chase than their pur- 
suers. A very large number of these vessels were captured, and it is believed that a balance- 
sheet, illustrative of the pecuniary results of the business, in th& aggregate, would show a loss to 
the violators of law. 



1864.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 7Q9 

Island for the purpose of co-operating. Early on that day the fleet sailed in 
between Forts Morgan and Gaines, the vessels tethered to each other in couples, 
and the Admiral himself lashed to the rigging at the main-top of his flag-ship, 
the Hartford, that he might overlook his whole fleet, and not be thrown down 
by the shocks of battle.' All went safely, in spite of the opened guns of the 
fort, excepting the iron-clad Tecumseh, which was destroyed by a torpedo.* 
They drove before them three Confederate gun-boats. The forts were passed, 
their fire had become almost ineftectual, and the battle seemed to be over, 
when a Confederate " ram," called the Tennessee, commanded by Buchanan, 
of Merrimac fame,^ came swiftly down the bay, accompanied by the other gun- 
boats, and made a dash at the fleet. A brief but furious naval engagement 
now ensued, which resulted in the capture of the Tennessee, and a complete 
victory for the Nationals.'* 

Farragut noAV turned his attention to the forts. He shelled Fort Gaines, on 
Dauphin Island; and on the following day [August 7, 1864] it was surrendered, 
for Granger and his troops were threatening its rear. Then Farragut turned 
upon Fort Morgan, the far stronger work, situated on Mobile Point, on the 
site of Fort Bowyer.^ Granger's troops were transferred to that peninsula 
[August 17], and invested the fort, and on the 23d, its commander, seeing no 
chance for relief or escape, surrendered it.* With the two forts the victors 
received one hundred and four guns, and 1,464 men. By this victory the port 
of Mobile Avas eftectually closed, and the land operations against the city, 
which occurred some months later, became easier and more speedily effectual. 
The victories at Mobile and Atlanta,' following close upon each other, with 
minor successes elsewhere, and the noble response given to the call of the 
President a few weeks before [July 1 8] for three hundred thousand men to 
re-enforce the two great armies in the field, gave assurance that the end of 
the Civil War and the return of peace was nigh. Because of these triumphs, 
and the hopeful aspect of affairs, the President issued a proclamation [Sept. 3, 
1864] in which he requested the people to make a special recognition of divine 
goodness, by offering thanksgivings in their respective places of w^orship on 
the following Sabbath [Sept. 11]. And on the same day he issued orders for 
salutes of one hundred guns to be fired at several places in the Union.'* 

While the National armies were struggling desperately, but almost every- 

' By means of a tube extending from his lofty position to the deck, Farragut communicated 
Ms orders. He exemplified in this act a characteristic remark of his own, that ''exposure is one 
of the penalties of rank in the navv." 

^ The Tecumseh was commanded by Captain Craven. She was sunk almost instantly, and 
Craven and nearly all of his officers and crew went down in her. Only 17 men out of 130 were 
saved. 

^ See page 614. 

* The Union loss in this contest was 335, of whom 165 were killed, including the 113 who 
went down in the Tecuimeh. The Confederates lost nearly 300, chiefly in prisoners. Admiral 
Buchanan was severely wounded. With him were captnred 190 men. 

^ See page 438. 

« These forts were about thirty miles from Mobile. Into Fort Morgan about three thousand 
shells were cast before it surrendered. 

' See page 702. ,^ ^ „ 

" At Washington, New York, Boston, Philadelphia. Pittsburg. Baltunore. Newport (Ken- 
lucky), St. Louis,^New Orleans, Mobile Bay, Pensacola, Hilton Head, and Now Berne. 



710 THE NATION. [1864. 

where successfully, during the summer and autumn of 1864, the people in the 
Free-labor States Av^ere violently agitated by a political campaign, the chief 
objective of which, to use a military phrase, was the election of a President of 
the Republic, as Mr. Lincoln's term of office would expire early in the ensuing 
spring. At a " Union " National Convention, held at Baltimore on the 7th 
of June, a series of ten resolutions were adopted, by which the party there 
represented were pledged to sustain the government in its war against rebel- 
lion, and to uphold its position in regard to slavery. The acts of the President 
touching the prosecution of the war for the life of the ReiDublic, were heartily 
approved, and an amendment of the Constitution, so as to do away with 
slavery forever, was recommended.^ Mr. Lincoln was nominated for the Presi- 
dency by a unanimous vote of the delegates, and Andrew Johnson, of Ten- 
nessee, then Military Governor of that State, was nominated for the Vice- 
Presidency.'-' 

On the 29th of August, the Opposition, or "Democratic" party held a 
National Convention at Chicago, over which Governor Seymour, of New York, 
presided, and who, in his address on taking the chair, took strong groimd 
against the war. Besides the delegates gathered there, a vast concourse of 
members of the " Knights of the Golden Circle," and other secret associations 
in sympathy with the Conspirators, together with Confederate officers from 
Canada, crowded Chicago, and the most inflammatory speeches were made at 
outside meetings.^ It is asserted that the gathering of these disloyal men, and 
these inflammatory harangues, were parts of a scheme for making that the occa- 
sion for inaugurating a counter-revolution in the West, the first act to be the 
liberating and arming of 8,000 Confederate pi-isoners then in Camp Douglas, 
near Chicago, and at Indianapolis. These schemes were frustrated by the vigi- 
lance and energy of Colonel B. J. Sweet, then in command (fver Camp Douglas.'* 

^ In these resolutions the noble services of the soldiers and sailors were recognized ; the 
employment of freednien in the public service was recommended; the duty of the government to 
give equal protection to all its servants was asserted ; and the rigid inviolability of the National 
faith pledged for the redemption of the public debt, was enjoined as a solemn duty. 

^ Already there had been a convention at Cleveland [May 31, 1864], composed, as the call for 
it directed, of "the radical men of the nation." About 350 delegates were present, and after 
adopting a series of thirteen resolutions, they nominated General John C. Fremont for President, 
and John Cochrane of New York, for Vice-President. "When, at a later period, it was seen that 
these nominations might make divisions in the Union ranks, both candidates withdrew. 

^ Mr. G-reeley, in his American Conflict, ii. 667, gives specimens of speeches by two clergymen 
belonging to the Peace Faction, at outside meetings in Chicago. One of them, named Chauncey 
C. Burr, said that Mr. Lincoln "had stolen a good many thousand negroes; but for every negro 
he had thus stolen he had stolen ten thousand spoons. It had been said that if the South would 
lay down their arms, they would be received back into the Union. The South could not honor- 
ably lay down their arms, for she was fighting for her honor. Two millions of men had been 
sent down to the slaughter-pens of the South, and the army of Lincoln could not again be filled, 
either by enlistments nor conscription " The other clergyman alluded to, named Henry Clay 
Dean, exclaimed: "Such a failure has never been known. Such destruction of human life had 
never been seen since the destruction of Sennacherib by the breath of the Almighty. And still the 
monster usurper wants more men for his slaughter-pens. . . . Ever since the usurper, traitor, 
and tyrant had occupied the Presidential chair, the Republican party had shouted ' "War to the knife, 
and the knife to the hilt!' Blood lias flowed in torrents; and yet the thirst of the old monster 
was not quenched.'' 

* Mr. Greeley says (^mer/ca« Conflict, ii. 668, note 19): ""Weeks later, with larger means and a 
better organization, the Conspirators liad prepared for an outl^reak on the day of the Presidential 
election ; but Sweet, fully apprised of their designs, pounced upon them on the night of Novem- 




IF.AmMiv.©Iinr Eif^ISIEHM© M(Q)IBEILE ISiSf, 



1864.] 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



711 




C. L. VALLANDIGHAM. 



In the Convention there prevailed a decidedly anti-war feeling. C. L. Val- 
landigham' had come boldly from his exile in Canada/ and was the master- 
spirit of that body. He was the most 
active man on the committee appointed 
to prepare a platform or declaration of 
princijiles for the coming canvass, 
whereof James Guthrie, of Kentucky, 
was chairman. This was in the form 
of six resolutions, the second of which 
declared the war to be a failure, and 
that " humanity, liberty, and the pub- 
lic welfare," demanded its immediate 
cessation. The last resolution tendered 
the " sympathy of the Democratic par- 
ty" for the soldiers in the field, and 
assured them that if that party should 
obtain power, they should " receive all 
the cure and protection, regard and 
kindness," which they deserved. 

The Convention then proceeded to nominate General George B, McClellan 
for President, and George H. Pendleton for Vice-President. The latter, next 
to Vallandigham, had been the most bitter opponent of the war, in Congress. 
The former had once been general-in-chief of the armies for crushing the rebel- 
lion. He accepted the nomination, and, with such candidates and such plat- 
forms, the two parties went into the canvass. The voice of the Convention, 
declaring the war a failure, had scarcely died away, when a shout went over 
ihe land, announcing the victories of Sherman and Farragut, and great guns 
thundered a joyful accompaniment to anthems of thanksgiving chanted by 
the loyal people. Mr. Lincoln was re-elected by an unprecedented majority, 
McClellan securing the electoral vote of only the two Slave-labor States of 
Delaware and Kentucky, and the State of New Jersey. The ofier of sympathy 
and i>rotection to the soldiers in the field, by the Chicago Convention, was 
-answered by the votes of those soldiers in overwhelming numbers against the 
nominee of that Convention. They did not regard the war they had so nobly 
■waged as " a failure," and they required no " sympathy and protection " from 
any political party.^ 



her 6, making prisoners of Colonel G. St. Leger Grenfell, who had been John Morgan's adjutant; 
Colonel Vincent Marmaduke [brother of the rebel general of that name] ; Captahi Cantrill, of 
Morgan's old command, and several Illinois traitors, thus completely crushing out the conspiracy, 
just as it was on the point of inaugurating civil war in the North." 

1 See page 656. * See note 1, page 657. 

^ On account of the secret operations of the Peace Faction, in giving " aid and comfort " to 
the enemies of the Republic, those who belonged to it were called, by the Unionists, Copperheads, 
in allusion to the habit of the venomous American snake of that name; which, unlike its equally 
venomous but more magnanimous fellow-reptile, that gives warning of danger to its intended vic- 
Tim, always bites from a hidden place and without any notice. The epithets ,of " Copperhead " 
and " Black Republicavi " (the latter in allusion to the desire of the Republican party to give 
freedom lo ihe negro slaves), were rife among politicians during a greater portion of the Civil 
War. 



fj^-^2 THE NATION. [1864. 

Let lis now return to the consideration of military events. 

General Sherman gave his army more than a month's rest at Savannah, 
when he began his memorable march northward through the Carolinas. Gen- 
eral Blair was sent, with the Seventeenth Corps, by water to Port Royal, and 
then to Pocotaligo, to menace Charleston, while the bulk of the army crossed 
the Savannah River, into South Carolina, at different points at about the first 
of February [1865], the extreme left under General Slocum, with Kilpatrick's 
cavalry, passing it at Sister' Ferry. These forward movements at widely 
sepai'ated points, distracted the Confederates, and prevented their concentrating 
a large force anyAvhere. Incessant rains had flooded the whole low country 
by the overflow of rivers, and Wheeler's cavalry, hovering around the National 
advance, had felled trees everywhere in their path. 

Steadily and irresistibly the entire army moved nearly due north in the 
direction of Columbia, the capital of South Carolina, which was surrendered 
to Sherman on the iTth of February. There had been, thus fai-, no formid- 
able resisting force in front of the National army ; and that which opposed it 
in the vicinity of Columbia, being under the command of the incompetent 
Beauregard,' was easily swept away. The flag of the Republic was raised 
over the old State House, and also the unfinished new one. Wade Hampton,^ 
in command of the Confederate rear-guard, had ordered all the cotton in the 
city to be piled in the public sti-eets, and fired, notwithstanding the wind was 
blowing a gale. The consequence was that the city was set on fire, and a 
large portion of that beautiful town was laid in ashes. 

The fall of Columbia was the signal for the Confederates to evacuate 
Charleston, which Sherman's army had now flanked. Hardee fled, and on the 
18th [February, 1865], colored Union troops marched in and took possession 
of the city, which they found in flames, the torch having been applied by the 
Confederates when they left. Then the National flag was raised over Fort 
Sumter, Avhere it was first dishonored by the Conspirators,^ and on the fourth 
anniversary of the evacuation of that fortress. General Anderson,^ with his 
own hand, raised over the fort the identical flag which he had been compelled 
to pull down, but not to surrender. 

Sherman moved onward into North Carolina, making a track of almost 
absolute desolation, forty miles in width, across South Carolina. The chief 
obstacles to his march, for some time, were the cavalry of Wheeler and Hamp- 
ton, with whom Kilpatrick had some sharp skirmishes. The whole army 
reached Fayetteville, in North Carolina, on the 12th of March, and there 
Sherjuan communicated with the troops under General Schofield, on the coast. 
And now Johnston was on his front with a concentrated force drawn from 
the west and the coast region, together with Hardee's from Charleston, and 
cavalry, making an aggregate of not less than 40,000 men, mostly veterans. 

' Beauregard was placed iu command of Hood's shattered army. [See page 707], and h& 
was afterward succeeded by General Joseph E. Johnston, its old commander. At the time we- 
are considerinpr. the bulk of that army was pressing forward, under General Cheatham, to gaia 
Sherman's front. 

" See page 553. . ^ See oag^ 550. 



1865.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. JJ'jg 

In view of this formidable obstruction to iiis northward jjrogress, and tlie 
necessity for giving rest to his army, Slierman halted at Faj^etteville tliree 
days. 

While Sherman was moving through the interior of South Carolina, there 
had been efticient and important co-operative movements on the coast of Xorth 
Carolina. When it was determined to close up the harbor of Mobile ' it was 
also determined to seal up that of Wilmington, the more difficult one to 
blockade effectually. An expedition was fitted out against the fortifications 
that guarded the entrance to it, in the autumn of 1864, composed of a powerful 




INTERIOR OF PORT FISHER. 



fleet under Admiral D D. Porter, and land troops under the immediate 
command of General Godfrey Weitzel. This expedition, accompanied by 
General Butler, the commander of the Department, appeared off Fort Fisher 
late in December [1864], and made a. combined movement against that work,, 
the main fortification, on Christmas day. The fleet opened a terrible bombard- 
ment of the fort ; and at the middle of the afternoon, a little over 2,000 
troops were landed upon the narrow tongue of land on which the fortress 
stood ; but its many guns, with one exception, having been untouched by the- 
shells from the fleet, and being ready to sweej) the peninsula Avith murderous- 
effect, it was thought prudent not to make an attack ; so the troops Avithdrew. 
The fleet remained, and General Grant promptly sent another land force, under 
General A. II. Terry, to co-operate with it in an attack on the fort. 

Profiting by the experience of Christmas-day, Porter took a position for 
more effectual Avork on the fort, and under cover of a fire from the fleet, Terry 
landed, with 8,000 men on the 13th of January. A bombardment of more 
than thirty hours silenced a greater portion of the guns which commanded the 
peninsula, when the army, skillfully handled, and bravely acting in conjunction 
with 2,000 sailors and marines, assaulted and carried the Avorks on the 15th. 
There Terry, Avho was too Aveak to advance, Avas joined on the 9th of February 
by General Schofield, Avho had been called from Tennessee, by Grant, and sent 
down the coast in steamers, from the Potomac. This re-enforcement raised 
the number of the land troops to about 20,000 men. Schofield, the senior 
officer, took command. ThroAving a portion of the troops across the Cape 
Fear River, the Nationals advanced on Wilmington, the Confederates abandon- 



<^14 TH^ NATION. ■ [1865. 

ing Fort Audersoii, and Luniiug the pirate steamers Tallahassee and Chicha- 
mauga^ lying iii tlio river. They also fled from Wilmington, after burning 
cotton, and naval military stores there ; and on the 22d of February [1865], the 
victorious Nationals entered that city. Soon after this an army tug and a gun- 
boat Avent up the Cape Fear, from Wilmington, and opened communication 
between Sherman and Schofield.- 

At the end of three days of rest, Sherman's army advanced from Fayette- 
ville, where they had destroyed the government armory, and the costly 
machinery which had been taken there from Harper's Ferry.' The army 
moved, as before, in a deceptive and distracting way, a portion of the left 
wing covered by Kilpatrick, marching in the direction of lialeigh, while the 
remainder of the left, with the right wing, moved eastward toward Goldsboro', 
the real destination of the army. Rains had made the roads almost impassable, 
yet the troops moved steadily forward, and on the morning of the 16th [March, 
1865], not far from Averysboro', Confederates under Hardee, about 20,000 
■strong, were encountered by Slocum. A severe battle ensued, which lasted until 
night, when the Nationals were victorious. Eacli party lost about four hundred 
and fifty men. The Confederates retreated toward Smithfield, under cover of 
darkness, when Slocum moved on toward Goldsboro'. He was soon attacked 
[March 18], near Bentonville, by nearly the whole of Johnston's army. That 
able leader fully expected to crush Slocum, before he could receive support ; 
but he Avas mistaken. Six desperate assaults made by Johnston were repulsed, 
and when night fell, Slocum held his ground firmly. That night he was 
re-enforced, and the next day Johnston's^ forty thousand men were confronted 
by sixty thousand Nationals, who, in endeavoring to gain the flank and rear 
•of their antagonist, frightened him away. Johnston retreated [March 21] 
rapidly on Raleigh.'' Sherman then moved on to Goldsboro', Avhere he met 
Generals Schofield and Terry, Avho had fought their way from Wilmington,' 
•driving the Confederates before them, and entered 1;hat town on the 20th of 
March. Sherman now went in a swift steamer from New Berne to City Point, 
where he held a consultation [March 27] with the President, and Generals 
■Grant and Meade, and returned to Goldsboro' three days afterAvard. 

Let us now turn our attention to the Gulf region again. There avc haA-e 
•seen Farragut and Granger, preparing the way for the capture of Mobile. 
After that, arrangements Avere made for securing the repossession of all Ala- 
bama. For this purjDose General Canby, in command of the Gulf Department, 
moved [March, 1865] over tAA^enty-fiA^e thousand troops against Mobile: while 
General Wilson, of Thomas's army, with fifteen thousand men, Avhereof thirteen 
thousand Avere mounted, SAvept doAvn into Alabama, at about the same time, 
from the Tennessee River, Avith sixty days' supplies carried by a ti-ain of two 
hundi-ed and fifty Avagons. Wilson left Eastport, on the Tennessee, late in 
February, and pushed rapidly into Northern Alabama, across the head-Avaters 
of the Tombigbee River, and by quick moA^ements menaced simultaneously 

' See page 708. " See page 713. ^ See page 557. 

* In the engagement near Bentonville, the Nationals lost 1,643 men, of whom 191 were killed. 
They buried 267 of their foes, left on the field, and took 1,625 prisoners. 



1865.J LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



715 



Columbus, in Mississippi, and Tuscaloosa, and Selma, in Alabama. He first 
encountered Confederate^ in force, under Roddy, on the banks of the Cahawba. 
Forrest was in chief command in that region, and strained every nerve to 
cover Selma, on the Alabama River, where the Confederates had an arsenal 
and armory, and very extensive founderies. His efforts were vain. He was 
there with a motley force of about seven thousand horsemen, when Wilson 
arrived [April 2, 1865], with nine thousand cavalry. A sharp conflict ensued, 
but Wilson soon took the city, and tlie public works of the Confederates there 
were utterly destroyed.' 

Wilson moved toward Montgomery on the 10th, and reached that city, the 
capital of Alabama, on the 12th, when he found that the Confederates had 
just burned 125,000 bales of cotton. The city was instantly surrendered, and 
was spared. Then the raiders moved eastward [April 14], destroying rail- 
ways and other public pi'operty, all the way to the Chattahoochee ; and near 
Columbus, Georgia, they had a severe fight, captured the place and twelve 
hundred prisoners, and destroyed a large amount of property.* On the same 
day a part of Wilson's force captured Fort Tyler, a strong work commanding 
the railway crossing of the Chattahoochee at West Point. On the following 
morning, nearly the whole of his command were across that stream, on their 
way toward Macon, in Georgia, where they arrived on the 21st [March, 1865]. 
The remainder, under Cuxton, reached there on the 30th, after a destructive 
raid over a route of six hundred and fifty miles, in the space of thirty days. 
This march through Alabama and Georgia, so slightly resisted everywhere, 
made Wilson readily believe the assurance of General Howell Cobb, in com- 
mand at Macon, that the war was virtually ended.^ 

While Wilson w^as on his triumphant ride, Canby was busy in the reduc- 
tion of Mobile. The Seventeenth Corps reached Dauphin Island on the 12th 
of March, when Canby moved his entire disposable force against the Confed- 
erate defenses of that city. The "thirteenth Corps, General Granger, moved 
up from Mobile Point, to strike the post from the east, and General Steele, 
moved from Pensacola, with a division of colored troops, on Blakely. At the 

1 Wilson's loss in the encounter, was about 500 men. He captured 32 guns, and 2,700 
prisoners, with vast stores of every kind. The Confederates had just burned 25,000 bales of 
cotton, and Wilson burned 10,000 more. The arsenal, foundries, and workshops of every kind 
were destroyed, and the town was sacked. When the writer was there a year later the place 
presented a scene of great desolation. 

^ The Confederate "ram" Jackson was destroyed; 15 locomotives, 250 cars, 115,000 bales of 
cotton, wefe burnt, and a vast amount of stores were consigned to destruction. With the 
prisoners were captured 52 field giuis. Wilson's loss was only 2-t killed and wounded. 

■•' There had been some important raids in Mississippi three or four mouths earlier than this, 
designed, chiefly, to attract attention from General Sherman's march through Georgia. One of 
these, under General Dana, went out from Vicksburg, to Jackson, fought a Confederate force on 
the Big Black River, and destroyed the railway [November 25, 1864], and a great deal of other 
property. Another, under General Davidson, went out from Baton Rouge, doing similar work, 
and alarming tlie garrison at Mobile. Another, led by General Grierson, went out from Memphis, 
[Dec. 21], and sweeping southeasterly througli Northern Alabama to Tupelo, broke up the 
Mobile and Ohio railway some distance soutluvard from Okolona, and destroyed a largo quantity 
of stores. At the little railway station of Egypt he had a sharp fight, in which he routed his 
foes, and then went raiding through Mississippi. The expedition finally made its way to Vicks- 
burg with 500 prisoners, 800 beeves, and 1,000 negroes. A great amount of property had been 
destroyed. 



71(5 THE NATION. [1865. 

same time a brigade was transported to Cedar Point, on the west side of the 
bay, nndcr a heavy fire of shells from the National iron-clad vessels. After a 
preliminary struggle, a siege was begun [March 25] in front of Blakely and 
Spanish Fort, the chief defenses of Mobile, in which the land troops and the 
fleet co-operated. These posts fell on the 9th of April. General Maury, in 
command at Mobile, noAV saw that the works immediately around the city 
were no longer tenable, and on the 10th and 11th, he fled iij^ the Alabama, 
with nine thousand troops, leaving five thousand prisoners in the hands of 
the victors, with one hundred and fifty guns. The victory had cost the 
Nationals about twenty-five hundred men,' 

General Grant's chief business throughout the Avinter of 1864-65, was to 
hold the Confederate army and " Government " in Virginia, and prevent the 
former joining forces with Johnston in North Carolina, to crush Sherman. 
So, while Sherman was making his way from the Savannah, around to the Cape 
Fear and the Neuse rivers. Grant was holding Lee and his fifty thousand 
men, Avith a tight grasp, ujson the James River. The Confederates well knew 
the reason of Grant's comparatively defensive attitude during the winter 
months, but were powerless either to strike him a damaging blow, or to compel 
him to be an aggressor. Only twice, during the winter, did he show a 
disposition to attack. Early in December Warren was sent out [Dec. 7, 1864] 
by Meade to destroy the Weldon road near the North Carolina line, which the 
Confederates were using to advantage ; and again in February two corps, with 
cavalry, were sent [Feb. 5, 1865] across that road, to Dinwiddle Court-House, 
apparently for the purpose of feeling the strength of the Confederates in that 
direction, which resulted in a severe action, Avith a loss of about 2,000 men on 
the 23art of the Unionists, and 1,000 by the Confederates. The National gain 
was the extension of their line, permanently, to Hatcher's Run. In the meg,ni 
time, the Confederates, perceiving the AvithdraAval of a large part of the naval 
force on the James River, for service against Fort Fisher,' sent a squadron* 
doAvn that stream, under cover of darkness [January 23, 1865], to do Avhat mis- 
chief they might. They gained nothing, and lost one of their Avooden gun-boats. 

Tlie Confederate horsemen, under Mosby, Rosser, McNeil, and others, were 
somcAvhat active in "West Virginia, and in the vicinity of the Baltimore and 
Ohio raihvay, during the Avinter. Sheridan Avas then at Winchester, in the 
Shenandoah Valley. He easily brushed away these annoyances on his flank, 
and at the close of February, he left head-quarters Avith 10,000 mounted men 
for a grand raid, ordered by Grant, on Lee's communications generally, and 
against Lynchburg, his great , store-house of supplies, especially. Sheridan 
swept through Staunton [March 2], scattered Early's forces at Waynesboro',* 
and proceeded to Charlottsville, destroying the railroad on the Avay. There 

' Before he evacuated the city, Maury sunk two powerful rams which had been built there. 
In addition to the loss of men, tlie Nationals had four gun-boats, and one transport sunk by 
torpedoes. '^ See page 713. 

^ The sfjuadron consisted of three iron-clad, and five wooden gun-boats, and three torpedo 
boats. 

* Early had 2,500 men. Sheridan captured 1,600 of them, with 11 guns, 17 battle-flags, and 
200 loaded wagons. 



1865. J 



LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 



717 



he demolished manufactories, bridges, and otlier ])roperty, when, satisfied that 
Lynchburg was too strong for him, he divided' his forces, one column for the 
destruction of the railway in the direction of Lynchburg, and the other for the 
demolition of the James River Canal. Then he passed around Lee's left to 
White House, and joined the Army of the Potomac on the 27th of March. 

Sheridan's raid was most destructive, and it thoroughly alarmed Lee, wlio 
clearly perceived that he must break through the armies encircling jiim, and 
form a junction with Johnston, or his own army, and with it the Confederacy, 
must perish. For that purpose he concentrated his forces near Grant's center, iu 
front of Petersbiirg, and 

made a desperate attack ^-J '■^ "^ ^ a^^"^ '^^^^^^■^ >- ^ ^ 

on Fort Steadman, for the .^ j;- 

purpose of cutting in two 
the Army of the Potomac. 
They carried that work, 
"but were no further suc- 
cessful, and the assault 
was not only repulsed, 
Avith heavy loss to the 
Confederates,^ but it re- 
suited in the gain to the 
Nationals of a portion of 
their antagonists' line. 
Lee's chance for escape 
into North Carolina was 

made more remote, by this movement. Grant had now prepai-ed for a gen- 
eral advance by his left, and for that purpose, large bodies of troops Avere 
called from the Army of the James on the north side of the river. The grand 
movement was begun on the 29th [March, 1865], when Slieridan, Avith 10,000 
•cavalry, was on the extreme left of the Union army, joined on his right 
by the Second and Fifth Corps, under Humphreys and Warren, Avhile General 
Parke held the extended lines. Lee perceived the imminent peril of his army, 
and liastened to attempt to avert it. Leaving Longstreet Avith 8,000 troops to 
hold Richmond against the depleted Army of the James, he massed his forces 
■on his endangered right. A desperate struggle ensued, chiefly by Warren, on 
the Ifnion side, in Avhich, at one time, Lee was almost victorious. MeauAvhile 
Sheridan was vigorously co-operating, but Avas driven at Five Forks, to Din- 
widdle Court-House [April 1, 1865], Avhere he held his position until his foe 
Avithdrew under cover of night. The heavy fighting in that vicinity resulted 
in final success for the Nationals. 

On the evening of the first of April, Grant ordered the guns all along the 
front of Petersburg to open upon the Confederate works and the city. It Avas 
done, and an awful night it Avas for the Confederate troops in the trenches, and 
the fcAV inhabitants in the toAvn. At dawn [April 2, 1865], the works Avere 




FOET STEADMAN. 



Each army lost about 2,500 men in the struggle. 



718 



THE NATION. 



[1865. 






assailed by infantry, and some of tliem were carried. Equal success was 
attending similar eftbrts on the extreme left. Longstreet had come down 
from Richmond to help, but it was too late. Lee held Petersburg, but his 
right was too much crushed to hope to retrieve disasters in that direction. 
He had lost 10,000 men; and he now saw but a narrow door through which 
there was any possibility for his army to escape into North Carolina, and that 
Avas liable to be shut any moment. So he telegraphed to Davis, at Richmond, 
in substance : " My lines are broken in three places ; we can hold Petersburg 
no longer; Richmond must be evacuated this evening."^ 

A scene of wildest confusion appeared in the Confederate Capital that 
afternoon, when it became known that the city was to be evacuated by the 
troops. Consternation filled the minds and hearts of all friends of the Con- 
spirators, and hundreds fled from the doomed town. Davis and his " Cabinet " 
were speedily on the wing to secure their personal safety; and, at midnight, a 
lurid glare shot up from the brink of the river. The Confeder.ate authorities, 
in disregard of the danger to the city, had ordered the burning of warehouses 
containing military stores. These were then in flames; and before sunrise a 
greater portion of the principal business part of Richmond was a crumbling, 
smoking ruin. At an early houi", General Weitzel (who was in command 
of the troops on the north side of the river), with his staif, entered the aban- 
doned and bui-ning city, followed by colored troops ; and then Lieutenant J. L. 
De Peyster, of Weitzel's military family, raised the flag of the Republic over 
the State Capitol. General G. F. Shepley was appointed Military Governor 
of Richmond, and Lieutenant-Colonel Manning was made Provost-Marshal.^ 

Davis and his " Cabinet " — his more immediate associates in the Great 
Ci-ime — fled to Danville, whither Lee hoped to follow with his army. But 

_^z^ ^ ^ loyal men, with trusty 

^^^ ^^^^ ^^^ r * arms, stood in his way. 

=^^^ "^ .,= Petersburg had also been 

evacuated, and the Army 
of Northern Virginia, re- 
duced to about 35,000 
men, was concentrated 
at Chesterfield. They 
moved rapidly AvestAvard, 
but Avere confronted by 
Sheridan not far from 
Amelia Court - House. 
There were active move- 
ments and considerable 
fifrhtinsr for three or four 




THE C.U»ITOL AT rjCHilOND. 



1 This was ou Sunday forenoon, April 2, 1865. The message found Davis in the house of 
-worship he was in the habit of attending. He left the church immediately, without saying a 
word to any one, but nobody misinterpreted his exit. 

'' Weitzel took 1.000 prisoners in the city, besides 5,000 sick and wounded, in the hospital. 
Also 500 guns, full 5,000 small-arms, 30 locomotives, 300 cars, and a large amount of other pub- 
lic property. 



1865.] LINCOLN'S ADMINISTRATION. 7I9. 

days afterward, while Lee was making desperate efforts to escape. Finally, 
near Appomattox Court-IIouse, the last charge of the Army of Northern Vir- 
ginia, with the hope of breaking through the National lines, was made on the 
morning of the 9th of April. It was unsuccessful ; and on that day, Grant 




:# 



^i^ 



M LEAN S HOtrSE. 

and Lee met at the house of W. McLean,' near the Court-House, Avhere terms of 
surrender on the part of Lee, were agreed upon. These terms were very 
generous.* 

' It is a curious fact that Mr. McLean, whose residence at the beginning of the war was on a 
portion of the battle-field of Bull's Run, and had left that region for another that promised more 
quiet, was again disturbed by the clash of arms at the close of the war. 

* The Confederate army, officers and men, were paroled on the condition that they were not 
to take up arms against their government until properly exchanged. " The arms, artillery, and 
public property," ran Grant's letter to Lee [April 9, 1865], "to be parked and stacked, and turned 
over to the officers appointed by me to receive them. This will not embrace the side-arms of the 
officers, nor their private horses or baggage. This done, each officer and man will be allowed ta 
return to his home, not to be disturbed by United States authority so long as they observe their 
paroles and the laws in force where they may reside." 

This generous offer of full amnesty for Lee and his companions-in-arms, who had. been 
waging war for four years agaiust their government, was gladly accepted by them ; and on the 
following day [April 10, 1865] Lee, regardless of that generosity, and under the shield of that 
sacred promise, issued an address to his troops, commendatory of their devotion to the cause of 
the Conspirators in the following words : — 

" After four j-ears of arduous service, marked by unsurpassed courage and fortitude, the Army 
of Northern Virginia has been compelled to yield to overwhelming numbers and resources. I 
need not tell the brave survivors of so many hard-fought battles, who have remained steadfast to 
the last, that I have consented to this result from no distrust of them; but feeling that valor and 
devotion could accomplish nothing that would compensate for tlie loss that must have attended a 
continuance of the contest, I determined to avoid the useless sacrifice of those whose past ser- 
vices have endeared them to their countrymen. By the terms of agreement, officers and men can 
return to their homes and remain until exchanged. You will take with you the satisfaction that 
proceeds from the consciousness of dutv faithfuDy performed, and I earnestly pray that a merci- 
ful God will extend to .you his blessing and protection. With an increasing admiration of your 
constancy and devotion to your country, and a grateful remembrance of your kmd and generous 
eonsideration for myself, I bid you all an affectionate farewell." 



720 ^^^ NATION. [1865. 

President Lincoln had been at City Point several days previous to the 
evacuation of Richmond, and two days after that event [April 4] he was con- 
veyed to that city in a gun-boat, and with Admiral Porter and a small escort 
went to the head-quarters of General Weitzel, in the house lately occupied by 
Jefferson Davis, where he received a lai-ge number of army officers and 
citizens. He afterward rode around the city in an open carriage, and then 
returned to City Point. This visit was repeated two days afterward [April 5,] 
when Mr. Lincoln returned to Washington City, full of joy because of the 
prospect of a speedy return of peace. There was gladness throughout 
the Republic ; and the sounds of rejoicing were swelling louder and louder 
everywhere, when they were suddenly hushed into silence by the awful 
tidings that the hand of an assassin had taken the life of the good President. 
While Mr. Lincoln was seated, Avith his wife, in a private box in a theater 
at Washington City, on the evening of the 14th of April, a man named John 
AVilkes Booth crept stealthily behind him, and shot him through the head with 
a pistol-ball. Then leaping upon the stage with the cry of " Sic semper 
tyrannis " — the legend of Virginia's State seal — Booth turned to the audience, 
brandishing a dagger, and exclaimed, " The South is avenged ! ''"' and imme- 
diately fled out of the theater by a back passage. The murderer was soon 
afterward mortally wounded in an attempt to capture him ; and several of 
his confederates, one of whom attempted to assassinate the Secretary oi 
State, the same evening, were arrested, tried by a military commission, and 
hung.'^ 

Ml*. Lincoln expired on the morning of the loth of April, and less than six 
hours afterward, his constitutional successor, Andrew Johnson, the Vice-Presi- 
dent, took the oath of office as President of the Republic." Thoughtful people, 



' There appears t-j have been a conspiracy for assassinating not only the President, but other 
members of the Executive Department of the government ; also General Grant and distinguished 
leaders of the Republican party. The object seems to have been to put out of the way men in 
tigh places opposed to the Conspirators who, on the death of the President, might administer the 
government, hoping thereby to produce anarchy which in some way might lead to the accession 
to power of the leaders of the rebellion. By a strange oversight in the managers of the scheme, 
"the Vice-President, who would 'legally succeed tlie murdered President, seems to have been 
omitted in their list of victims, there being no evidence that anj' attempt was made to take his 
life. He immediately assumed the reinsi of government without any disturbance of its functions'; 
and on the 2d of May he issued a proclamation which w'as countersigned by William Hunter, 
"acting Secretary of State," charging that the crime of Booth and his associates had been 
" incited, concerted, and procured, between Jefferson Davis, late of Richmond, Ya., and Jacob 
Thompson, Clement C. Clay, Beverly Tucker, George X. Sanders, W. C. Cleary, and other rebels 
and traitors against the government of the United States, harbored in Canada." He offered a 
reward of $100,000 for the arrest of Davis, and from $10,000 to $25,000 each for the arrest of the 
■other persons named. 

^ Mr. Johnson requestea Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet ministers (see note 2, page 551) to remain, and 
they did so. At that time they consisted of William H. Seward, Secretary of State ; Hugh 
McCuhough, Secretary of the Treasury; Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War; Gideon Welles, 
Secretary of the Navy; John P. Usher, Secretary of the Interior; James Speed, Attorney- 
General; and William Dennison, Postmaster-General. Mr. Chase, the former Secretary of the 
Treasury, had been elevated to the seat of Chief-Justice of the United States, on the death of 
Judge Taney. Mr. Stanton had succeeded Mr. Cameron in the War Department, early in 1862; 
and President Lincoln, satisfied that the pubhc good required the removal of Montgomery Blair, 
the Postmaster-General, bad asked liim to resign. The request was granted, and Mr. Dennison 
was put in his place. Caleb Smith had di«d, and Mr. Lusher had taken his place. 




cXaS^^^ 



5] 



JOHNSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



721 



i^^J^^ 




who regarded private virtue as the basis of public integrity, and who sadly re- 
membered the conduct of the Vice-President at his inauguration only a few weeks 
before, which shocked the moral sense of 
right-minded citizens, were filled with 
gloomy forebodings concerning the fu- 
ture of the Republic, for the most pro- 
found wisdom and exalted virtue in the 
Chief Magistrate were needed at that 
critical time. But the new incumbent 
of the chair of Washington made the 
most satisfactory promises with so much 
apparent sincerity, that the people 
trusted him. How that confidence was 
requited, the history of his administra- 
tion reveals.^ 

On the surrender of Lee, the Con- 
federacy fell, and the war was speedily 
ended. Sherman, immediately on hear- 
ing the glad news, moved from Golds- 
boro' against Johnston. Stoneman, meanwhile, had been making a successful 
raid in the rear of Johnston, and in aid of Sherman. He proceeded from 
Knoxville, in East Temiessee, late in March, to destroy the railway in the 
direction of Lynchburg, from Wytheville. There he turned southward, and 
swept down into North Carolina, where he struck and destroyed the railway 
between Danville and Greensboro', and then pushed on toward Salisbury, 
where a large number of Union prisoners had been confined. He was met ten 
miles from that town by a Confederate force, which he routed, capturing all 
their guns (14) and 1,364 prisoners. In Salisbury he destroyed a vast amount 
of public property. Sherman ordered him to remain operating in Johnston's 
rear, in aid of his own movement against the Confederate front, but Stoneman 
refused to do so, and returned to East Tennessee. 

On the 10th of April, Sherman moved upon Johnston at Smithfield. The 
latter burned the bridge over the Neuse, and retreated on Raleigh, destroying 
the railway behind him. Sherman followed him sharply. The pursued and 
pursuers pushed on, in heavy rains, in the direction of Hillsboro', where the 
<^hase was ended by a note from Johnston to Sherman [April 14], inquiring 
whether the latter was Avilling, for the purpose of stopping the further eflusion 
of blood, to agree to a temporary suspension of hostilities until General Grant 

1 Andrew Johnson was born in Raleigh, North Carolina, on the 29th of December, 1807. He 
was taught the business of a tailor at an earlj age. During his apprenticeship he learned to 
read, but was not able to write or cipher until, at the age of twenty years, he was taught by his 
young wife, when he was settled in Greenville, in East Tennessee, in the business of garment- 
maKing. He became an Alderman of that vUlage, and was Mayor for three years. He was 
chosen a member of the Tennessee Legislature, and was a Presidential elector m 1840. In 1843 
he was elected to Congress, and in 1853, was chosen Governor of Tennessee. In 1857 he was 
elected a National Senator. In 1863 he was appointed Military Governor of Tennessee, and in 
the autumn of 1864, was chosen to be Vice-President of the United States. He arose to tli« 
Presidency on the death of Mr. Lincoln. His career in that office is noticed in the text. 

46 



722 



THE NATION. 



[1865, 



should be asked to take action in regard to the other armies, similar to that 
had in the case of general Lee's. Sherman promptly complied with Johnston's 
■wishes, and met that general at Durham Station on the l7th. On the follow- 
ing day an agreement Avas signed by the two generals, which would, in effect, 
instantly restore to all persons who had been engaged in the rebellion every 
right and privilege, political and social, they had enjoyed before they rebelled,, 
without any liability to punishment. It proposed an utter forgetfulness, prac- 
tically, of the events of the war, and made it a hideous farce with the features 
of a dreadful tragedy. The government, of course, rejected it, and sent Grant 
to Sherman to direct an immediate resumption of hostilities. This was fol- 
lowed by the surrender of Johnston's army to Sherman, on the 26th, on the 
generous terms accorded to Lee. The surrender of other bodies of troops 
speedily followed, and early in May the armed Rebellion was ended.' 

Expecting Lee and his army at Danville, the fugitive " President of the 
Confederacy " attempted to set up a government there, but when he heard of 
the surrender of Lee and his army, he and his "cabinet," fled in the direction 
of Mississippi. Difficulties lay in their way, and they turned southward with 
a daily diminishing cavalry escort. The " government " soon dissolved, each 
member seeking safety as best he might, Davis, accompanied by his family, 
and by Reagan, his "Postmaster-General," pushed on toward the Gulf of 

Mexico, over whose waters he hoped to 
escape from the countiy. His flight had 
been made known to the vigilant Wilson, 
at Macon,' who sent out cavalry forces in 
quest of him. Lieutenant Pritchard, of the 
Fourth Michigan, leading one of these de- 
tachments, found the fugitive encamped 
near Irwinsville, the capital of Irwin County, 
in Georgia, and captured him on the 11th 
of May.^ Pritchard conveyed Davis and 
his party, to Macon, whence the fallen 
chief was sent to Fortress Monroe.^ There 
he was confined in one of the casemates — 
a most comfortable prison — and treated 
with marked kindness during a long cap- 
tivity, when he was admitted to bail, charged with the crime of Treason. 

The armies of the Republic, whose fortitude, valor, and skill had saved 

' E. Kirby Smith, commanding in Texas, was disposed to longer resistance. On hearing of 
the surrender of Lee, he issued an address to his troops, urging them to a continuance of the 
struggle in that region The hxst tight of the Civil War occurred not far from Brazos Santiago, in 
Texas, on the i:5th of May. Soon after that. Smith and others were fugitives in Mexico. 

^ See page 716. 

^ Davis was found in a disguise, composed of a wrapper, and a woman's shawl thrown over 
his head, and was making his way, with a bucket, toward a spring where his horses and arms 
were. In this disguise, and seeming avocation, he appeared like a woman, but it did not save 
him. 

* Alexander H. Stephens, the " Yice-President of the Confederacy" (who was arrested at 
about this time, at his home in Crawfordsville), and " Postmaster-General" Reagan, were sent to 
yort "Warren, in Boston Harbor. They were released in the autumn. 




DATIS'S PRISON, FORTRESS MONROE. 



1865.] JOHNSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 723" 

its life, and achieved tiie freedom of an enslaved race, were now seen making 
their way homeward, everywhere received with the warmest demonstrations- 
of affection. The military prisons were opened, and the captive Confederate- 
soldiers were set free and kindly sent to their homes at the expense of the 
vovernment.^ On the 2d of June General Grant issued a stirring farewell' 
address to the " Soldiers of the Armies of the United States ;" ^ and by mid 
autumn [1865], the wonderful spectacle was exhibited of vast armies of soldiers, 
surrounded by all the paraphernalia of War, transformed, in the space of one 
hundred and fifty days into a vast army of citizens, engaged in the blessed 
pursuits of Peace.* No argument in favor of free institutions, and a repub- 

' The number of Confederate prisoners released, after the close of hostilities, was 63,442. 
Tlie number surrendered and paroled in the several Confederate armies, was 174,223. It is a 
fact, susceptible of the clearest proof, that the treatment of Confederate prisoners, as a rule, was 
humane, and even generous, while the treatment of Union prisoners was exactly the reverse. 
The sufferings of captives at Ricliraond, Salisbury in Nortli (Jarolina, Danville in Virginia, and 
especially at Andersonville, in Georgia, were awful, and witliout excuse. It is a proven fact 
that General Winder, placed in charge of the Andersonville prisoners, inaugurated a systena 
of treatment which surely tended to the absolute destruction or permanent disablement of 
the captives in his hands. It is plainly evident that a system of treatment intended, if not 
actually to murder, surely to permanently disable the Union prisoners of war, by unwhole- 
some and insufficient diet, was inaugurated and carried out. The records of Andei-son- 
ville show this. There the prisoners were actually tortured, and starved to death, in the 
midst of plenty, as the march of Shennanthrough that State in the autumn of 1864, developed.. 
See note 2, page 703. It may be well to note, in this connection, the fact, sliown by the- 
records of the War Department, that 230,000 Confederate soldiers were captured during the- 
war, of whom 20,430 died of wounds or diseases during then- captivity, while of 126,940^ 
Union soldiers captm-ed, nearly 23,000 died while prisoners. It is estimated that the whole 
number of Union captives was* about 196,000, of whom 41,000 died while prisoners. 

' The following is a copy of General Grant's address: " Soldiers of the Armies of the United 
States: By your patriotic devotion to your country in the hour of danger and alarm, your 
magnificent fighting, bravery and endurance, you have maintained the supremacy of the Union, 
and the Constitution, overthrown all armed opposition to the enforcement of the laws, and of 
the proclamation for ever abolishing slavery — the cause and pretext of the Rebellion — and opened 
the way to the rightful authorities to restore order, and inaugurate peace on a permanent and; 
enduring basis on every foot of American soil. Your marches, sieges, and battles, in distance,, 
duration, resolution, and brilliancy of results, dims the luster of the world's past military achieve- 
ments, and will be the patriot's precedent in defense of liberty and right, in all time to come>. 
In obedience to your country's call, you left your homes and families, and volunteered in her- 
defense. Victory has crowned your valor, and secured the purpose of your patriotic hearts p 
and, with the gratitude of your countrymen, and the highest honors a great and free nation can 
accord, you will soon be permitted to return to your homes and families, conscious of having 
discharged the highest duty of American citizens. To achieve these glorious triumphs, and 
secure to yourselves, your fellow-countrymen, and posterity, the blessings of free institutions, 
tens of thousands of your gallant comrades have fallen, and sealed the priceless legacy with their 
blood. The graves of these, a grateful nation bedews with tears, honors their memories, and wilk 
ever cherish and support their stricken families." 

' The records of the "War Department show that, on the first of March, 1865, the muster-rrfls? 
of the army exhibited an aggregrate force of 965,591 men; of whom, 602,593 were presen-t for- 
duty, and 132,538 were on detached service. By the middle of October following, 785,205 were- 
mustered out of the service. 

The whole number of men called into the service during the war, was 2,628,523. Of these,. 



Y24 '^^^^ NATION. [1865. 

lican form of government, so conclusive and potential as this, was ever before 
presented to the feelings and judgment of the nations of the earth. The great 
political problem of the nineteenth century, was solved by the Civil War. Our 
Kepublic no longer ap^^eared as an experiment but as a demonstration. 

After the terrible convulsion of the Civil War — the paralysis of State 
governments, and the entire disruption of the industrial and social system of 
a large portion of the Republic — came the business of reorganization, not of 
reconstruction, for no institution worthy of preservation had been destroyed. 
No State, as a component part of the Republic, had been annihilated. Those 
in which rebellion had existed were simply in a condition of suspended 
animation. They were all equal, living members of the CommonAvealth, 
incapacitated by derangements for healthful functional action, and awaiting 
resuscitation at the hands of the only healer, the National Government. To 
that resuscitation — that reorganization, and fitting for active life, the govern- 
ment was now called upon to employ its powers. 

A preliminary step toward reorganization was taken by the President on 
the 29th of April, 1805, when he proclaimed the removal of restrictions on 
commercial intercourse with the inhabitants of States in which rebellion had 
existed. A month later [May 29], he issued a proclamation, slating the terms 
by which the people of the paralyzed States, with specified exceptions, might 
receive full amnesty and pardon, and be reinvested with the right to exercise 
the functions of citizenship. This was followed by the appointment by the 
President of provincial governoi's for seven of those States,^ clothed with 
authority to assemble citizens in convention, who had taken the amnesty oath, 
with power to reorganize State governments, and secure the election of repre- 
sentatives in the National Congress. The plan was to restore to the States 
named, their former position in the Union without any provision for securing to 
the freedman the right to the exercise of citizenship, which the amendment to 
the National Constitution, then before the State Legislatures, would justly 
entitle them to.^ The i-eorganized State governments were bound only to 
i-espect their freedom. 

about 1,490,000 were in actual service. Of this number, nearly 60,000 were killed on the field, 
and about 35,000 were mortally wounded. Disease in camps and hospitals slew 184,000. It is 
estimated that 300,000 Union soldiers perished during the war. Full that number of the Confed- 
erate soldiers perished; and the aggregate number of men, including both armies, who were 
crippled, or permanently disabled by disease, was estimated at 400 000. The actual loss to the 
country, of able-bodied"men, in consequence of the Rebellion, was fully 1,000,000. 

' These were North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, and 
Texas. 

^ On the 31st of January, 1865, the House of Representatives passed a joint resolution, already 
adopted by the Senate at a previous session, for an amendment to the National Constitution, in 
the following words : — 

"Sectiox 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, 
whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any 
place subject to their jurisdiction. 

•' Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation." 

This amendment was adopted by a vote of 119 yeas, against 56 nays. Eight members did 
not vote. Senator Wilson, one of the most earnest and able of the pubhc men of the country, 
in labors for this consummation, says, in his Anti Slavery Measures in Congress, page 393, that 
when the Speaker announced that the required two-thirds majority had voted in ftivor of the 
joint resolution, the House and the spectators gave expression to their satisfaction by an outburst 
of applause. " The Repubhcan members," he says, " instantly sprang to their feet, and applauded 



1865.] JOHNSON'S ADMINISTRATION. ^25 

This total disregard of the liighest interests of the freedmen, and the fact 
that the President was making haste to pardon a large number of those who 
had been active in the rebellion, and Avould exercise a controlling influence in 
the States which he was equally in haste to reorganize on his plan, startled 
the loyal men of the country, and made them doubt the sincerity of his 
vehement declarations of intention to punish traitors and to make treason 
odious.' They felt that Justice, not Expediency, should be the rule in the 
readjustment of the affairs of the Republic ; and it was demanded, as an act of 
National honor, that the freedman, when made a citizen by the Constitution, 
should have equal civil and political rights and privileges Avith other citizens, 
such as the elective franchise. 

It soon became evident that the President was willing to take issue, upon 
vital points of j^rinciple and policy, with the party which had carried the 
country triumphantly through the great Civil War, and had given him the 
second office in the Pepublic' And, at the close of the year, it was plain to 
sagacious observers that the Chief Magistrate was more friendly to the late 
enemies of his country than consistency with his profession, or the safety of 
the Republic, would allow. As a consequence of that friendliness, it was per- 
ceived that the politicians who had worked in the interest of the rebellion, and 
newspajiers which had advocated the cause of the Confederates, had assumed a. 
belligerent tone toward Congress and the loyal people, which disturbed the 
latter by unpleasant forebodings. Meanwhile measures for perfecting peaceful 
relations throughout the Republic had been taken. The order for a blockade 
of the Southern ports was rescinded [June 23, 1865]; more of the restrictions 

with cheers and clapping of hands. The spectators in the crowded galleries waved their hats^ 
and made the chambers ring with enthusiastic plaudits. Hundreds of ladiea gracing the gallerip 
with their presence, rose in their seats, and, by waving their handkerchiefs, and participating irt 
the general demonstration of enthusiasm, added to the intense excitement and interest of a scene 
that will long be remembered b}' those who were fortunate enough to witness it." 

When tli'is crowning act of Emancipation was accomphshed, Mr. Ingersoll of Illinois, said : 
" In honor of this immortal and subhme event, I move that the Hoiise adjourn." The motion 
was carried by 121 to 24. On the following day, it was resolved to send the Act to the State 
legislatures for ratification ; and on tlie ISth day of December following, the Secretary of State, bj 
proclamation, certified that three-fourths of the legislatures had ratified it. 

» The fiery zeal with which tlie new President denounced treason and traitors, made moderate 
men fear that he would deal too harshly with tliem. To a delegation from New Hampsl lire, who 
waited upon him soon after his inauguration, he said : " Treason is a crime, and must be punished 
as a crime. It must not be regarded as a mere difference of political opinion. It must not be 
excused as an unsuccessful rebellion, to be overlooked and be forgiven. It is a crime before which 
all other crimes sink into insignificance." Similar, and even severer language toward those who 
had lately tried to destroy the Republic, was used by him at that time. 

■■' So early as August, or about four months after his accession to the Presidency, Mr. Johnson 
manifested an unfriendly feeling toward the most earnest men of the Republican party, and wlio 
had been most zealous supporters of the government during the war. In a telegraphic dispatch 
to Mr. Sharkey, whom he had appointed provisional governor of Mississippi, he recommended 
[August 15, 1865] the extension of the elective franchise to all persons of color in that State, who 
could read the National Constitution or possessed property valued at S'-^oO. This would affect but 
very few people of that class, who, in that State, were kept enslaved and poor by the laws. 11 1.^ 
sole motive for the recommendation, as appears in the dispatch, was expressed in these words : 
" Do this, and, as a consequence, the radicals, who are wild upon negro franchise wdl be com- 
pletely foiled in their attempt to keep the Southern States from renewing their relations to the 
Union." More than a year before, Mr. Lincoln had suggested similar action to the Governor ot 
Louisiana, but with a different motive. " They would probably help," he said, almost propheti- 
cally, " in some trying time to come, to keep the jewel of Liberty in tJiefamUy of Freedom, —letter to 
Michael Hahn, March 13, 1864. 



Y26 ^^^^'^ NATION. [18G5. 

on internal commerce were removed [August 29] ; State prisoners were paroled 
[October 12]; and the act suspending the privilege of the writ of Habeas 
4Jorpus was annulled [December 1]. 

The provisional governors appointed by the President were diligent in 
«carrying out his policy of reorganization, and before Congress met, in Decem- 
ber, conventions in five of the disorganized States had ratified the Amendment 
of the Constitution concerning slavery ; formed new constitutions for their 
respective States, and caused tiie election of representatives in Congress. The 
President had hurried on the work by directing the provisional governors of 
the five States to resign their power into the hands of others elected under the 
.new constitutions. Some of these had been active participants in the rebellion, 
rand some of the Congressmen elect, in those States, had been hard workers, it 
?tvas said, in the service of the enemies of the Republic. The loyal people 
•^vere filled with anxiety because of these events, and the assumptions of powers 
by the President in doing that which, as prescribed by the Constitution, 
belongs exclusively to the representatives of the people to do. Yet they 
waited, with the quieting knowledge that Congress had a right to judge of the 
qualifications of its members, and with the belief that disloyal men would not 
be allowed to enter that body over the bar of a test oath prescribed by law.' 

When Congress assembled [Dec. 4, 1865], the subject of reorganization 
was among the first business of the session, and by a joint resolution a com- 
anittee of fifteen Avas appointed' to make inquiries and report. This was 
riinown as the " Reconstruction Committee." This action offended the Presi- 
"dent. It was an interference of the representatives of the people with his 
chosen policy of reorganization, and hostility to Congress was soon o^jcnly 
manifested by him. This was vehemently declared by the President in a 
speech to the populace in front of the Presidential Mansion on the 22d of Feb- 
ruary [1866] — a speech which Americans would gladly blot from the record of 
<their country — in which, forgetting the dignity of his position and the gravity 
^of ihe, questions at issue, he denounced, by name, leading members of Con- 
jgress, and the party which had given him their confidence. The American 
ipeople felt humiliated by this act ; but it was a small matter when compared 
•with wbat occurred later in the year [August and September, 1866], when the 

1 By an Act passed on the 22d of July, 1862, Congress prescribed that every member should 
:make oath that he had not " voluntarily borne arms against the United States since ho had been 
a citizen thereof," or " voluntarily given aid, countenance, counsel, or encouragement to persons 
■engaged in hostility thereto," and had never "yielded voluntary support to any pretended gov- 
ernment, authority, power, or constitution within the United States, hostile or inimical thereto." 

^ On the first day of the session, the House of Representatives, by a vote of 133 against ^i". 
proposed, and agreed to a joint resolution to appoint a joint committee, to be composed of nir.e 
members of the House and six of the Senate, to "inquire into the condition of the States which 
; formed the so-called Confederate States of America, and report whether they, or any of them, arc 
••entitled to be represented in either House of Congress, with leave to report at any time, by bill 
< or otherwise ; and until such report shall have been made and finally acted upon by Congress, no 
iraember shall be received in either House from any of the so-called Confederate States ; and all 
papers relating to the representatives of the said States, shall be referred to the said committee." 
■ The resolution was adopted by the Senate on the 14th. The House appointed Messrs. Stevens, 
Vashburne, Morrill, Grider, Bingham, Conkling, Boutwell, Blow, and Rogers, as its representa- 
:tives in the committee, and the Senate appointed Messrs. Fessenden, Grimes, Harris, Howland. 
Johnson, and Williams. 



1866.] JOHNSON'S ADMINISTRATION. ^27 

President and a part of his Cabinet, with the pretext of honoring the deceased 
Senator Douglas by being present at the dedication of a monument to his 
memory at Chicago, on the 6th of September, made a journey to that city and 
beyond. He harangued the people in language utterly unbecoming the chief 
magistrate of a nation, and attempted to sow the dangerous seeds of sedition, 
by denouncing Congress as an illegal body, deserving of no respect from the 
people, and the majority of its members as traitors, " trying to break up the 
government." That journey of the President, so disgraceful in all its features 
— its low partisan object, its immoral performances, and its pitiful results — 
forms a dark paragraph in the history of the Republic' 

Having laid aside the mask of assumed friendship for those who had 
labored most earnestly for the suppression of the rebellion and for the freed- 
men, the President used his veto power to the utmost in trying to thwart the 
representatives of the people in their efforts to reorganize the disoro-anized 
States, and to quickly secure a full and permanent restoration of the Union on 
the basis of equal and exact justice.' He made uncompromising war upon the 
legislative branch of the government, and caused members of his cabinet, who 
could not agree with him, to resign, with the exception of the Secretary of 
AYar. The friends of the Republic urged that officer to remain, believing his 
retention of his bureau at that critical period in the life of the nation would 
be for the public benefit. He did so, and became the object of the President's 
hatred. 

On the 2d of April, the President, by proclamation, declared the Civil 
War to be at an end. Congress, meanwhile, was working assiduously in per- 
fecting its plans for reorganization. Tennessee was formally restored to the 
Union by that body on the 23d of July; and on the 28th of that month, after 
a long and arduous session. Congress adjourned. Meanwhile notable events in 
the foreign relations of the government had occurred. The Emperor of the 
French had been informed that the continuation of French troops in Mexico 
was not agreeable to the United States, and on the 5th of April [1866], Napo- 
leon's Secretary for Foreign Affairs gave assurance to our government that 

' A convention had just been held [Aug. 14] in PhUadelpliia, composed chiefly of men who 
had been engaged in the rebellion, and the enemies of the Republican party, for the purpose of 
organizing a new party, with President Johnson as its standard-bearer. So discordant were the 
elements there gathered, that no one was allowed to debate questions of public interest, for fear 
of producing a disruption and consequent failure of the scheme. It utterly failed. A convention 
of loyal men from the South Was held in Philadelphia soon afterward, in which representatives 
of the Republican party in the North participated. The President's journey being wholly for a 
political purpose, members of the latter convention followed in liis track, making speeches in 
many places in support of the measures of Congress for effecting reorganization. 

So disgraceful was the conduct of tlie President at Cleveland and St. Louis, in the attitude of 
a mere demagogue making a tour for partisan purposes, that the common council of Cincinnati, 
on liis return journey, refused to accord him a public reception. The common council of Pitts- 
burg, iu Pennsylvania, did the same. When, on the 15th of September, the erring President and 
his traveling party returned to Washington, the country felt a relief from a sense of deep 
mortification. 

^ On the 19th of February, 1866, he vetoed the act for enlarging the operation.^, oi the Freed- 
man's Bureau, established for the relief of freedmen, refugees, and abandoned lands. On the 27th 
of March he vetoed the act known as the Civil Rights Law, which was intended to secure to all 
citizens, without regard to color or a previous condition of slavery, equal civil rights in the 
Republic. This Act became a law, after it was vetoed by the President, by the vote of a constitu- 
tional majority, on the 9th of April. 



f^2S IRE NATION. [1866. 

those troops should be withdrawn within a specified time.' A military organ- 
ization of Irish residents of the United States, known as the Fenian Brother- 
hood, with the ostensible aim of procuring the independence of Ireland from 
England, made movements in May and June [1866] for a formidable invasion 
of the neighboring British provinces. Our government interfered, and the 
effort was a failure. With England, at about the same time, a peaceful bond 
of Union Avas formed, by the successful laying of a telegraphic cable between the 
two countries. The first dispatch, announcing the conclusion of a treaty of 
peace between Prussia and Austria, passed over it on the 29th of July, and on 
the following day the President of the United States received by it, from 
Queen Victoria, a message of congratulation because of the completion of the 
great work, which she hoped " might serve as an additional bond between the 
United States and England." So early as October, 1862, telegraphic commu- 
nication had been opened across this continent between the coasts of the 
Atlantic and Pacific oceans ; and Avhile the great Civil War was in progress, 
our government cordially promoted an enterprise having for its object a line 
of telegraphic communication around the world, by connecting Asia and 
America, with the delicate cord, at Behring's Straits. 

The State elections held in the autumn of 1866 indicated the decided 
approval by the people, of the reorganization plans of Congress as opposed to 
that of the President, who was now openly afl&liated with the Democratic party 
and the late enemies of the government in the South and elsewhere. The 
majority in Congress felt strengthened by the popular approval of their course, 
and went steadily forward in perfecting measures for the restoration of the 
Union. They took steps for restraining the action of the President, who, it 
was manifest, had determined to carry out his own policy in defiance of that 
of Congress. And as an indication of the general policy of the latter, con- 
cei-ning suffrage, a bill was passed [December 14] l)y a large majority of 
both Houses for granting the elective franchise in the District of Columbia, 
over Avhich Congress has direct control, to persons, " Avithout any distinction 
on account of color or race." The President vetoed the bill [January 7, 1867], 
when it was re-enacted by the constitutional vote of two-thirds of the mem- 
bers of both Houses in its favor. On the same day [January 7], Mr. Ashley, 
Representative from Ohio, arose in his seat, and charged "AndreAV Johnson, 
Vice-President and Acting-President of the United States, with the commis- 
sion of acts which, in the estimation of the Constitution, are high crimes and 
misdemeanors, for which he ought to be impeached." He offered specifications 
and a resolution instructing the Committee on the Judiciary to make inquiries 
on the subject.** The resolution was adopted by a vote of one hundred and 
thirty-seven to thirty-eight, forty-five members not voting. This Avas the first 

' This was done, and the Archduke Maximilian, of Austria, whom Louis Napoleon had placed 
on a throne in Mexico, with the title of Emperor, was deserted by the pertidious ruler of France, 
and after struggling against the native Republican government for awhile, was captured and shot. 

^ Mr. Ashley presented the following : " I do impeach Andrew Johnson, Vice-President and 
acting President of the United States, of high crimes and misdemeanors. I charge him with 
usurpation of power and violation of law: (1) In that he has corruptly used the appointing 
power ; (2) In that he has corruptly used the pardoning power ; (3) In that he has corruptly uspd 



1867.] JOHNSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 'J'29 

public movement in the matter of the impeachment of the President, whicli 
i-esulted in his trial in May, 1868. 

At a former session of Congress, bills were passed for the admission of the 
Territories of Colorado and Nebraska as States of the Union. The President 
interposed. Now similar bills were passed, prescribing as a preliminary to 
admission a provision in their constitutions granting impartial suffrage to their 
citizens, and the ratification of the Amendment to the Constitution. The 
President vetoed them; when that for the admission or Nebraska was passed 
over his veto. That Territory became a State on the first of March, making the 
thirty-seventh. A bill limiting the authority of the President in making official 
appointments and removals from office, known as the " Tenure-of-Office Act," 
was passed, and was vetoed by the President, when it was passed over the 
veto.' Another bill was passed, vetoed, and passed over the veto, repealing so 
much of an Act of July 17, 1862, as gave the President power to grant amnesty 
and pardon to those Avho had been engaged in the rebellion. A bill was also 
passed, with the same opposition from the President, for the military govern- 
ment of the disorganized States.^ The Thirty-ninth Congress closed its last 
session on the 3d of March, and the Fortieth Congress began its first session, 
immediately thereafter. In view of the conduct of the President, which 
threatened the country with revolution, this action of the National Legislature 
was deemed necessary for the public good. It adjourned on the 31st of March, 
to meet on the first Wednesday in July. 

Congress assembled on the 4th of July, and on the 20th adjourned to meet 
on the 21st of November. The chief business of the short session was to 
adopt measures for removing the obstructions cast by the President in the way 
of a restoration of the disorganized States. A bill supplementary to the one 
for the military government of those States was passed over the usual veto of 
the President, and it was believed that the Chief Magistrate would refrain 

the veto power ; (4) In that he has corruptly disposed of public property of the United States ; 
and (5) In that he has corruptly interfered in elections, and committed acts which, in contempla- 
tion of the Constitution, are high crimes and misdemeanors." 

On the 14th of January, Representative Loan, from Missouri, in the course of a debate con- 
cerning the duty of the House to proceed to the impeachment of the President, said that the 
leaders of the rebellion comprehended the advantages of having such a man as the then incum- 
bent, in the Presideniial chair. "Hence," he said, " the assassination of Mr. Lincoln. The crime 
was committed. The way was made clear for the succession. An assassin's hand, wielded and 
directed by rebel hand, and paid for by rebel gold, made Andrew Johnson President of the 
United States of America. The price that he was to pay for his promotion was treachery to the 
Republic and fidelity to the party of treason and rebellion." Mr. Loan was called to order. The 
Speaker decided that he was not out of order, the subject of debate being the charges against the 
President of " high crimes and misdemeanors," a member having the right, on his own responsi- 
bility, »to make a specific charge. This decision was appealed from, when the Speaker was sus- 
tained bv a vote of 101 to 8. 

' It "took from the President, among other things, the power to remove a member of his 
cabinet, excepting by permission of tlie Senate, declaring that they should hold office " for and 
during the term of the President bv whom thev may have been appointed, and for one month 
thereafter, subject to removal by and with the consent of the Senate." The act was passed over 
the veto by a vote in the Senate of 35 to 11, and in the House of ]?,\ to 37. 

■•' Those States were divided into five military districts, and the following commanders were 
appointed : First District, Virginia, General J. M. Schofield ; Second District, North and South 
Carolina, General D. P]. Sickles ; Third District, Georgia, Florida, and Alabama, General J. Pope ; 
Fmirth District, Mississippi and Arkansas, General E. 0. C Ord ; Fifth District, Louisiana and 
Texas, General P. H. Sheridan. 



730 



THE NATION. 



[1867. 



from farther acts calculated to disturb the public peace. Not so. Immedi- 
ately after the adjournment of Congress, he proceeded, in defiance of that 
body, and in violation of the Tenure-of-Office Act, to remove the Secretary of 
War [Mr. Stanton], and to place General Grant in his place. The President first 
asked [August 5, 1867] the Secretary to resign. Mr. Stanton refused.* A 
week later the President directed General Grant to assume the duties of Secre- 
tary of War. Grant obeyed. Stan- 
ton retired, under protest, well satisfied 
that his office was left in the hands of 
a patriot whom the President could 
not corrupt nor unlawfully control.* 

The removal of the Secretary of 
War was followed by the removal of 
General Sheridan from the command 
of the Fifth District, and General 
Sickles from that of the Second Dis- 
trict, by which the country was notified 
that the most faithful officers, who 
were working with the representatives 
of the people for the proper and speedy 
restoration of the Union, would be 
deprived of power to be useful. Gen- 
eral Grant protested against these acts, but in vain. The country was greatly 
excited, and the loyal people waited with impatience the reassembling of Con- 
gress, npon which they relied in that hour of seeming peril to the Republic. 
That body met at the appointed time, and on the 12th of December the Presi- 
dent sent to the Senate a statement of his reasons for removing the Secretary 
of War. They were not satisfactory, and on the 13th of January the Senate 
reinstated Mr. Stanton, and General Grant retired from the War Department. 
Already Congress had made much progress toward the restoration of the dis- 
organized States, to the Union, by providing for conventions for framing con- 
stitutions and electing members of Congress ; and a few days after the restora- 
tion of INIr. Stanton, a new bill for the further reorganization of those States 
was passed by the House of Representatives, in Avhich larger powers were 




EDWIN M. STANTON. 



^ The President addressed a note to the Secretary, in which he said : " Grave public consider- 
ations constrain me to request your resignation as Secretary of War." The Secretary replied : 
" Grave public considerations constrain me to continue in the office of Secretary of "War uptil the 
next meeting of Congress." It was believed that the President was then contemplating a revo- 
lutionary scheme, in favor of the late enemies of the country, and was seeking to use the army 
for that purpose. 

" The President was angry with General Grant for quietly giving up the ofiSce to Stanton, at 
the bidding of the Senate, and he charged the General-in-Chief with having broken his promises, 
and tried to injure his reputation as a soldier and a citizen. A correspondence ensued, which 
speedily found its way to the public. It assumed the form of a question of veracity between the 
President and the General-in-Chief Finally, Grant felt compelled to say to the President : 
" When my honor as a soldier and integrity as a man have been so violently assailed, pardon me 
for saying that I can but regard this whole matter, from beginning to end, as an attempt to involve 
me in the resistance of law, for which you hesitated to assume the responsibility in orders, and 
thus to destroy my character before the country." The President did not deny this charge. 



18GS.] 



JOHNSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



731 



given to the General-in-Chief of the armies, in their military government, and 
depriving the President of all power to interfere in the matter. 

On the 21st of February, the President caused a new and more intense 
excitement throughout the country, by a bolder step in opposition to the will 
of Congress than he liad hitherto ventured to take. On that day he issued an 
order to Mr. Stanton, removing him from the office of Secretary of War, and 
another to Lorenzo Thomas, the Adjutant-General, appointing him Secretary 
of War, ad interim. These orders were officially communicated to the Senate, 
whereupon that body passed a resolution that the President luid no authority 
under the Constitution and laws to remove the Secretary of War. In the 
mean time Thomas had appeared at the War Department and demanded th.e 
position to which the President had assigned liim, when Mr. Stanton, his supe- 




= itjuiiii. 1 HP (I. mi I in 1 1 i 



{ MinilljilllUlNIMJ 



'mjki^^ 



rUE NATIUXAL CAPITOL. 



rior, refused to yield it, and ordered him to return to his proper office. The 
President being satisfied that he would not be permitted to use military force 
in the matter, did not attempt to eject Mr. Stanton by force, and so that officer 
retained his place. This action of the President was so manifestly in violation 
of law, that on the following day [February 22, 1868], the House of Repre- 
sentatives, by a vote of 126 to 47," "Resolved that Andrew Johnson, President 
of the United States, be impeached of high crimes and misdemeanors." ' On 
the 29th [February, 1868], a committee of the House, appointed for the pur- 

> Tliis was an almost strictly party vote. Only two Republicans (Gary of Ohio and Stewart 
of New York) voted in the negative, while all the Democrats voted agamst the resolution. 

» We have seen (page 728) that the subject of the impeachment of the President was referred 
to the t:ommittee on the Judiciarv. That committee submitted reports (Nov. 2.*), 18b i) which 
were acted upon on the 7th of December, when the House of Representatives, taking into con- 
sideration the gravity of such a proceeding, and indulging a hope that the President would cease 
making war upon Congress and attend to his legitimate duties as simply the Executor ot the 
poeple's wiU, expressed by their representatives, refused, by a large majority, to entertam a pro- 



^32 THE NATIOX. [1868. 

pose,' presented articles of impeachment, nine in number,* and these, Avith slight 
alterations, were accepted on the 2d of March.'^ The House then proceeded to 
the appointment of Managers, to conduct the business before the Senate,^ when 
the Democratic members of the House, to the number of forty-five, entered a 
formal protest against the whole proceedings. 

On the 5th of March [1868], the Senate was organized as a jury for the 
trial of the President. Chief-Justice Salmon P. Chase presided.* On the 7th 
the President Avas summoned to appear at the bar ; and on the 13th, when the 
Senate was formally opened for the inquest, he did so appear, by his counsel, 
who asked for a space of forty days wherein to prepare an answer to the 
indictment. Ten days were granted, and on the 23d the President's counsel 
presented an answer. The House of Representatives, the accuser, simply 
denied every averment in the answer, when the President's counsel asked for a 
postponement of the trial for thirty days. The Senate allowed seven days, 
and on Monday, the 30th of March, the trial began. The examination of 

position for impeachment. Now, so flagrant was the act of the President, that the RepubUcan 
members were eager to place liira upon trial, and several who were not present when the vote 
recorded in tlie text was taken, afterward entered their votes in favor of impeachment. 

' Tlie committee consisted of Messrs. Boutwell, Stevens (who made the motion for im- 
peachment), Bingham, Wilson, Logan, Julian, and Ward. Messrs. Stevens and Bingham were 
appointed a committee to announce to tlie Senate the action of the House. This they did on tlie 
25th (Feb.), when the Senate, by unanimous vote, referred the subject to a select committee of 
seven, to consider it. 

'^ The following is a brief summary of the cliarges in the Articles of Impeachment : — Article 1. 
Unlawfully ordering the removal of Mr. Stanton as Secretary of War, in violation of the 
provisions of the Tenure-of-OflBce Act. Article 2. Unlawfully appointing General Lorenzo 
Thomas as Secretary of War, ad interim. Article 3. Substantially the same as Article 2, with the 
additional averment that there was at the time of the appointment of General Thomas, no 
vacancy in the office of Secretary of War. Article 4. Conspiring with one Lorenzo Thomas, and 
other persons to the House of Representatives unlvnown, to prevent, by intimidation and threats, 
Mr. Stanton, the legally appointed Secretary of War, from holding that office. Article 5. Con- 
spiring with General Thomas and others to hinder the execution of the Tenure-of-OfRce Act; and 
in pursuance of this conspiracy, attempting to prevent Mr. Stanton from acting as Secretary of 
War. Article 6. Conspiring with General Thomas and others to take forcible possession of the 
property in the W^ar Department. Article 7. Repeated the charge of conspiring to hinder the 
execution of the Tenure-of-Office Act, and prevent Mr. Stanton from executing the office of Secre- 
tary of War. Article 8. Repeated the charge of conspiring to take possession of the War 
Deptytment. Article 9. Charged that the President called before him the commander of the 
forces in the Department of Washington and declared to him that a law, passed on the 30th of 
June, 1867 (see page 729). directing that "all orders and instructions relating to military opera- 
tions, issued by the President or Secretary of War, shall be issued through the General of the 
Army, and in case of his inability, through the next in rank," was unconstitutional, and not bind- 
ing upon the commander of the Department of Washington; the intent being to induce that com- 
mander to violate the law, and to obey orders issued directly from tlie President. 

On the 3d of March, the managers presented two additional articles, which were adopted by 
the House. The first charged that the President had, by inflammatory speeches, during his jour- 
ney from Washington to Chicago, already mentioned (page 727), attempted, with a design to set 
aside the autliority of Congress, to bring it into disgrace, and to excite the odium and resentment 
of the people against Congress and the laws it enacted. The second charged that in August, 
1866, the President, in a public speech at Washington City, declared that Congress was not a 
bod}' authorized by the Constitution to exercise legislative powers ; and tlien went on to specify 
his offenses in endeavoring by unlawful means, to prevent the execution of laws passed by Con- 
gress. These formed the 10th and 11th Articles of Impeachment. 

' The following members of the House of Representatives were chosen to be the managers, 
on its part, of the impeachment case: Thaddeus Stevens, of Pennsylvania; Benjamin F. Butler, 
of Massachusetts; John A.Bingham, of Ohio; George S. Boutwell, of Massachusetts ; James 
F. Wilson, of Iowa; Thomas Williams, of Pennsylvania, and John A. Logan, of Illinois. The 
chief management of the case, on the part of the House, as prosecutor, was intrusted to Mr. Butler. 

* See clause 6, section 3, of Article I., of the National Constitution, in the Supplement 



1868.1 



JOHNSON'S ADMINISTRATION. 



733 



witnesses was closed on the 22d of April, and on the following day the argu- 
ments of counsel began. These closed on the afternoon of Wednesday, 
the 6th of May, when the case was submitted to the judgment of the Senate. 
Its decision was given on the 26tli of the same month. Every member of 
the Senate was present and voted. Thirty-five pronounced the President 
guilty, and nineteen declared him not guilty. So he escaped conviction 
by one vote.' 




THE NATIONAL fciEXATE CHAMBER. 



The political campaign preparatory to an election of a new President of 
the Republic, had begun about a week before the final act in the impeach- 
ment case. On the 20th of May, a national convention of representatives 
of the Republican party assembled at Chicago, and by unanimous voice 
nominated General Ulysses S. Grant^ for the presidency, and Schuyler 
Colfax, then Speaker of the House of Representatives, for Vice-President. 
The party was immediately organized for action. The Opposition deferred 
their nominations until the 4tli of July, when, in a national convention 



1 The vote of the Senate was as follows : — /-, r. 

For Conviction— Mcssv^. Anthony, Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conklniff, Conncss Cor- 
bett, Cragin, Drake, EfVmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuvsen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, JMorrill 
of Vermont, Morrill of Maine. Morton, Nye, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Kamsey, 
Sherman, Sprague, Stewart, Sumner, Thayer, Tipton, Wade, WiUey, Williams, Wilson and lates. 
These wore all " Republicans." ^ , t^ , ,-. • 

For ^<-7,«y/«/— Messrs. Bayard, Buekalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fesscnden, Fowler, Grimes, 
Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreerv, Norton, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross Saulslniry, 
Eight of these, namely. Bayard, Buekalew, Davis, llen- 



Trumbull, Van Winkle, and Vickers. 
dricks, Jolinson, McCreery, Saulsbury, and Vickers 
The remainder were elected as " Republicans." 
2 See portrait of General Grant, on page 601. 



elected to'the Senate as " Democrats. 



Y34 THE NATION. - [186a 

lield in Tammany Hall, in New York City, Horatio Seymour of New York,' 
was named for President, and Francis P. Blair of Missouri, for Vice-Pres- 
ident. The canvass was carried on with great warmth on both sides. ^ 
The elections in November resulted in the choice of Grant and Colfax for 
the respective high offices, by very large majorities. 

In the meantime, important events in the process of the reorganization 
of the national Government had taken place. The subject of a fourteenth 
amendment of the Constitution proposed by Congress in July, 1866, for 
securing the rights of citizenship to all persons " born or naturalized in 
the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof;" disabling a 
certain class of cliief offenders in the late rebellion ; declaring the validity 
of the national debt, and forbidding the payment of any part of the so- 
called " Confederate debt," had been before the people and the State 
Legislatures for several months. ^ On the 20th of July, the Secretary of 
State publicly certified that the requisite number of States had ratified the 
proposed amendment, and on the following day. Congress, warned by the 
active opposition of the President to the measure,^ declared, by a concur- 
rent resolution, the amendment to be a part of the National Constitution. 
On the 28th of the same month, the Secretary of State issued a proclama- 
tion to that effect. As the work of reorganization had now been accom- 
plished in all but three States, and civil governments therein established, 
the General-in-Chief of the armies issued a proclamation (July 28, 1868) 
declaring that so much of the Reconstruction acts as provided for the 
organization of military districts, subject to the military authority of the 
United States, had become inoperative. 



1 See Note 3. pa,2:e 657. 

2 Wade Hampton, N. B. Forrest (see pages 682, 683,) and several other prominent leaders in 
the rebellion were members of the Democratic Convention, and were controlling architects of its 
platform, in which the acts of Congress for the re-organization of the Government were declared 
to be "usurpations, unconstitutional, revolutionary and void." In a letter written by Francis P. 
Blair, the nominee for Vice-President, a few days before the Convention, to Colonel James O. 
Brodhead, he laid down a plan for the inauguration of another civil war, in the event of the elec- 
tion of the Democratic nominees, in these words : " There is but one way to restore the Govern- 
ment and the Constitution, and that is for the President elect to declare these acts [of Congress] 
null and void, compel the army to undo its usurpations at the South, disperse the Carpet-bag State 
Governments, [established under the authority of Congress,] allow the white people to re-organize 
their own governments, and elect Senators and Representatives. The House of Representatives 
will contain a majority of Democrats from the North, and they will admit the Representatives 
elected by the white people of the South, and with the co-operation of the President it will not 
be difficult to compel the Senate to submit once more to the obligations of the Constitution." 

The Convention having approved this plan for usurpation, revolution and civil war, by the lan- 
guage of a portion of its platform, and the nomination of its author for the second office in the 
Government, large numbers of the patriotic and thinking men of the Opposition refused to accept 
that platform, and to vote for the nominees. In accordance with the feelings of all true Ameri- 
cans, General Grant, in his letter of acceptance, had said, " Let us have peace," and with that 
desire an immense majority of the people gave him and Colfax their support. 

3 See Article XIV of the Amendments of the Constitution, in Supplement. 

* The President took the position that the State Governments in the South, established by Con- 
gress, were illegal and could have no voice in national affairs ; consequently, the amendment was 
not ratified. He had also, on the 4th of July, issued a proclamation of general and unconditional 
pardon and amnesty for all who had been engaged in acts of rebellion, excepting a few who were 
under presentment or indictment for the offence. This was calculated to weaken the force of a 
uart of the amendment. 



J 



l^'^-'-J JOHNSON'S ADMINISTRATION ^o- 

Congress took a recess in August to meet again in September, if the 
public good should seem to require. The recess conthmed until near the 
time of the regular session, in December. Before the adjournment, the 
Senate had ratified an important treaty with the Emperor of China, by 
which mutual intercourse between the citizens of the United States and 
China, and mutual privileges of trade, travel, education and religion, 
should be secured to each. This was a concession never made by the 
Chinese to any nation.' During a greater part of the recess, the attention 
of the people was absorbed by the Presidential election ; and the result 
was such, that when Congress re-assembled, the Republicans in that body 
were very strong, not only in numbers, but in the moral power of a 
majority well sustained by the people. A condition of such strength is 
great responsibility. There was in the aspect of public affairs at home 
and abroad, reasons for the exercise of the greatest caution and wisdom. 
Among other perplexing and important duties was the devising ways for 
ending a war with the Indians which had been raging a long time on 
the great plains of the West, without positive results. To this end ; to 
the further security of rights to all citizens of the Republic ; and to the 
strengthening of the public credit, the attention of Congress was specially 
directed. 

The military leaders engaged in war with the Indians, recommended the 
most rigorous and unrelenting measures, and for that purpose it was pro- 
posed to vest the entire control of the Indians "^ in the War Department. 
But a more humane policy, promising excellent results, was finally adopted 
on tlie recommendation of General Grant after he became President. 
Ttecognizing the fact that the chief cause of wars with the Indians has 
been the injustice the red men were subjected to at the hands of dishonest 
or incompetent ofiicers in charge of them, and of the traders and con- 
tractors W'ith whom they are compelled to deal, the President recommended 
the appointment of a number of members of the Society of Friends or 
Quakers, who are noted for their general uprightness and peaceful princi- 
ples and conduct, as Indian Agents. Congress approved, and in April, 
(1869,) on the nomination of the President, sixteen Friends were chosen 
for the important service. 

A fifteenth amendment of the Constitution, intended to secure the exer- 
cise of the right of suffrage to all citizens of the RepubHc, without regard 

1 This treaty was negotiated, and brought from China by Minister Burlingame who, having been 
appointed by "the Emperor a general commissioner to several of the Christian powers of the Earth, 
came attended by high officials of the Chinese Empire. After concluding the business of his 
mission at home, h^ went to Europe with the embassadors. 

2 In one of his reports. General Sheridan, who was in command of the forces employed against 
the Indians, said : " Indian tribes should not be dealt with as independent nations. They arc 
wards of the Government, and should be made to respect the lives and property of citizens. The 
Indian history of this country for the last three hundred years shows that of all the great nations 
of Indians, only remnants have been saved. The same fate awaits those now hostde ; and the 
best way for the Government is to make them poor by the destruction of their stock, and then 
Bettie them on the lands allotted to them." 



7o6 THE NATION. [ISW. 

1:0 race, color, or previous condition, was recommended by a joint resolu- 
tion of both houses of Congress, on the 26th of February, 1869.^ It was 
immediately submitted to the authorities of the several States, for action,, 
and was ratified by the required number. 

At about the same time, an important financial bill was passed in the 
lower house of Congress, (and afterward in the Senate, and became a 
law,) the chief provision of which was as follows : " The faith of the 
United States is solemnly pledged to the payment in coin or its equiva- 
lent, of all interest-bearing obligations of the United States, except in 
cases .where the law authorizing the issue of any such obligation has 
expressly provided that the same may be paid in lawful money or other 
currency than gold and silver." This was intended to strengthen the 
public credit at home and abroad, and such was its effect in a remarkable 
degree. 

The administration of Mr. Johnson closed on the 4th of March, and on 
that day Ulysses S. Grant was inaugurated the eighteenth President of 
the Kepublic.2 The oath of oflice was administered by Chief Justice 
Chase. At noon, the same day, the Forty-first Congress assembled ; and 
on the 5th, the Senate promptly confirmed the President's Cabinet ap- 
pointments.^ The new administration began its career under circum- 
stances apparently very auspicious for the future prosperity of the nation. 
At home, the work of reorganization and pacification was going on pros- 
perously. Abroad, the relations of our Government were eminently 
peaceful. The only subject that promised difficulty in the future, waa 
the claims against Great Britain for damages inflicted by the Anglo-Con- 
federate ship Alabama, and others." The special business of Keverdy 
Johnson, lately appointed minister plenipotentiary to Great Britain, was 
the negotiation of a treaty for the settlement of those claims. It was ac^ 
complished, but the treaty was so unsatisfactory to our government and 
people that the Senate promptly rejected it by a vote of 54 to 1, and Mr. 
Motley, the historian, was sent to England to supersede Mr. Johnson. 

iThe following is a copy of tlie Amendment : 

"Article 15. The right of the citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied en 
abridged by the United States or any State, on account of race, color, or previous condition of 
servitude. 

"Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. 

2 Ulysses S Grant was born in Clermont County, Ohio, on the 27th of April, 1822. When a 
boy he was employed in his fether's tannery. He entered the West Point Military Academy in 
1839, and was graduated in 1843, when he entered the a;my as brevet second lieutenant. His 
conduct as a brave soldier, was conspicuous during his services in the war with Mexico, at the 
close of which he bore the brevet rank of captain. He received a commission as full captain in 
1 853 He left the army the next year, and settled near St. Louis. Fivb years later he became a 
partner with his father," in the leather trade, at Galena, Illinois. When the civil war broke out in 
1861, he entered the service in the field as colonel of the 21st Illinois Volunteers. His promotion 
from rank to rank was rapid. How he performed the duties of each position in which he was 
placed, these pages reveal, in brief outline. From a comparatively obscure leather dealer in 1861, 
he has arisen, in the course of eight years, to the highest official dignity in the Republic. 

2 It was found neoessarv to make some changes in the appointments. The following named 
gentlemen composed the cabinet as finally chosen : 

Secretary ,,/ State, Hamilton Fish. Secretary of the Treasury, George S. Boutwell. Secretary 
of War, John A Rawlins. Secretary of the Navy, Adolph E. Borie. Secretary of the Interior, 
Jacob D. Coxe Post master- General, John A. J. Creswell. Attorney- General, E. Rockwood Hoar. 

- See page 707- 



GKANT S ADMINISTKAl ION, 737 



CHAPTER XX 



When President Grant^ entered upon his duties lie found the reor- 
ganization of the Union incomplete, and on the 7th of April, 1809, he 
sent a message to Congress, urging that body to take steps for accom- 
plishing an object so important at as early a period as possible.^ The 
special session of the new Congress, which had been called, ended on the 
10th of April, when the Senate was convened for executive business, 
and continued in session until the 22d. 

The President and Congress took measures for securing the desired 
Union, and did all in their power under the restrictions of the amended 
National Constitution to induce the people of the States not represented 
in Congress to assist in bringing about that result. It was accomplished 
in the spring of 1872. On the 23d of May every seat in Congress was 
filled, for the first time since the winter of 1861, when members from 
several of the slave-holding States abdicated. On the previous day (May 
22, 1872) an Amnesty Bill was passed, for removing the political disa- 
bilities imposed by the third section of the Fourteenth Amendment to 
the Constitution from all persons excepting members of the Thirty-sixth 
and Thirty-seventh Congresses, heads of departments, members of diplo- 
matic corps, and officers of the army and navy, who had engaged in the 
rebellion. The political reorganization of the republic was now com- 
plete. 

At about the same time a most important event occurred in the 
social and commercial history of our country. It was the completion of 
a railway communication across our continent from the Atlantic to the 
Pacific ocean, by which the States bordering on the two seas and those 
between, were firmly linked in interest, and by which, also, a vast over- 
land trade with China and Japan, and the islands of the sea, was inaugu- 
rated. The last " tie " was laid, and the last spikes were driven, on the 
10th of May, 1869, in a grassy valley at the head of the Great Salt Lake 
in Utah. That " tie " was made of polished laurel wood, its ends bound 
with silver bands. A spike of gold was sent by California ; one of silver 

^ See portrait on page 601. 

' In that message the President said : *' It is desirable to restore the States -which 
were engaged in the rebellion to their proper relations to the government and tlie 
country, at as early a period as the people of those States shall be found willing to 
become peaceful and orderly communities, and to adopt and maintain such constitu- 
f ions and laws as will effectually secure the civil and political rights of all persons 
ivithin their borders." 



738 THE NATION. tlt^eat 

bj Kevada, and one of gold, silver, and iron hj Arizona ; and these 
were driven in the presence of three thousand people. So was com- 
pleted what is commonly known as the Union Pacific Railroad.^ 

An insurrection in Cuba had now assumed such proportions that the 
Americans, naturally sympathizing with a colony struggling for freedom, 
were disposed to give the insurgents moral and material aid, and expedi- 
tions were fitted out, under the general directions of a " Cuban Junta '' 
in New York City, for the purpose of carrying men and materials of 
war to the Cubans. Our government wisely resolved to maintain its 
neutrality, at least until the Cubans should show their ability to maintain 
their independence, and took measures to suppress all Jillihustering move- 
ments, at the same time, keeping faith with other governments. The 
United States authorities seized a large number of Spanish gunboats 
that had been built in this country, on suspicion that they were intended 
for war against Peru. They were soon released. 

These relations with Cuba and Spain gave the government of the 
United States much trouble, and, at times, war seemed inevitable. 
Finally, late in 1873, the steamship Virginius, flying the flag of this 
republic, suspected of carrying men and supplies to the Cubans, was 
captured by a Spanish cruiser ofi" the coast of Cuba, taken into port, and 
many of her passengers, with her captain and some of her crew, were 
shot by the local military authorities. The affair produced intense ex- 
citement in the United States. But the difficulties involved in it were 
"visely settled by diplomacy. The vessel was surrendered to the United 
i jates, and ample reparation offered. While the Virginius was on her 
"v ly, under an escort, to New York, she sprung a leak and went to the 
b ttom of the sea off Cape Fear, at near the close of December, 1 873. 

An organization of Irishmen in the United States, known as " Fe- 
nians," prepared to invade the British dominions on our frontiers, for the 
avowed purpose of liberating Ireland from British rule — how, in that 
way, is not clearly seen. In the last week in May, 1870, between two 
and three thousand of them had assembled on the borders of Canada, in 
Vermont, and there invaded that province. The authorities of both 
governments interfered, the leaders were arrested, and no similar viola- 
tion of the neutrality laws of the republic has since been attempted by 
adopted citizens. 

The possession of territory by the United States, among the West 
India Islands, has been considered desirable for a long time ; and in the 
year 1869 our government and that of Haj-^ti conferred upon the subject 

' To aid in the construction of this railway from Kansas to the Pacific, the na- 
tional government offered a subsidy of $52,000,000. The distance by railwaj 
betwe'^n New York and San Francisco, by way of Chicago, is, in round numbers, 
about, 8,400 miles. 



^^^1 grant's administration. 739 

of the annexation of the island to our domain. The President was de- 
cidedly in favor of the measure. In November, that year, a treaty for 
annexation was made, but the Senate of the United States refused to 
ratify it. More information was needed, and in December, ISTO, the 
President appointed a commission, composed of eminent and judicious 
citizens, to proceed to San Domingo and inquire concerning the resources, 
the political condition, and the disposition of the government and people 
of that republic on the subject of annexation. The report of the Com- 
mittee in the spring of 1872 did not lead to the ratification of the treaty, 
and the subject was dropped as a national measure. A private company 
made a treaty with the authorities of San Domingo in December, 1873, 
by which that government ceded to them a large portion of the island 
with valuable franchises and privileges. All the public lands on the 
peninsula of Samana, and the waters of Samana Bay, were ceded to the 
•' Samana Bay Company." 

An inter-oceanic ship canal across the Isthmus of Darien has been a 
subject before the public a long time. During President Grant's admin- 
istration some steps were taken in connection with such a project. In 
July, 1871, Commander Selfridge returned from an exploration of a 
route which he considered feasible. It was from the Xapipi river, a con- 
fluent of the Atrato river that empties into the Gulf of Darien, across 
the Isthmus to Limon Bay on the Pacific coast. The entire length of 
the can*»l would be thirty -two miles. Its cost he estimated at about 
$130,000,000, and the time to be occupied in its construction about twelve 
fears. In March, 1872, the President appointed a commission to exam- 
ine all plans and proposals for an inter-oceanic canal across the Isthmus.^ 
Meanwhile an international company had been formed in Euroiie to con- 
struct a canal across the Isthmus of Panama. 

In October, 1871, one of the most destructive fires on record con- 
sumed a large part of the business section of Chicago. It raged about 
twenty-eight hours ; spread over two thousand acres of ground ; laid 
twenty-five hundred buildings in ruins, and consumed property, real and 
personal, to the amount of about $200,000,000. Of this amount, $90,- 
000,000 worth was insured. In November the following year a fire in 
the heart of Boston swept over sixty acres of ground, and destroyed 
property to the amount of $75,000,000, on which was an insurance of 
$50,000,000. 

Mormonism, in its political relations to the state, remains a vexatious 
question. It seems to be strongly intrenched, in the heart of the conti- 
nent, among the everlasting hills ; and it appears to be popular among 

' Composed of Major-General A. A. Humphreys, Professor Benjamin Pierce, and 
Captain Daniel Ammen. 



740 THE NATION. [ISTI. 

the sex which the practice of polygamy most degrades. In 1871 the 
vlelegate in Congress from Utah presented to that body a petition fifty 
feet in length, signed by twenty-five hundred Mormon women, in favor 
of polygamy. The elective franchise has been given to women in that 
territory (as well as in Wyoming territory) ; and of the 215,324 votes 
cast in favor of a state constitution in Utah in 1872, nearly one-half 
were by women. They have enough citizens to entitle them to a state 
organization, but the moral sense of Congress has been strong enough to 
deny the polygamists a place in the Union of States. 

We have observed, on page 736, that the settlement of claims against 
Great Britain, on account of the depredations of the Alabama and other 
Anglo-Confederate vessels, was an open question when Grant became 
President. lie proposed a joint commission to negotiate a treaty for tlie 
adjustment of all pending difficulties between the two governments. 
Great Britain acceded to it, and each government appointed commis- 
sioners.' This "Joint High Commission," as it was called, met at 
Washington city, and on the 8th of May, 1871, completed a treaty which 
both governments promptly ratified. That treaty provided for the settle- 
ment, by arbitration by a mixed commission, of all claims on both sides 
for injuries by either government to the citizens of the other, during the 
Civil War; for the permanent regulation of the American coast-fish- 
eries ; for the free navigation of certain rivers, including the Ot. Law- 
rence, and for determining which of two channels between T aueonver's 
Island and the mainland, on the Pacific coast, constituted the boundary- 
line between the territory of the United States and Great Britain. 

In accordance with the provisions of this treaty, arbitrators were 
appointed.^ The Tribunal of Arbitration, as this was called, met at 
Geneva, in Switzerland, on the 15th of December, 1871, and organized 
by the appointment of Count Sclopis president of the board. After two 
meetings the Tribunal adjourned to the 15th of June following. The 
final meeting of the Tribunal was held on the 14th of September, 1872, 
when the decision was announced. The sum of fifteen million five hun- 
dred thousand dollars in gold was awarded to the government of the 
United States, to pay to its citizens for losses incurred by the depreda- 
tions of the Alabama and other Anglo-Confederate vessels. That 
.amount was paid into the Treasury of the United States in September, 

^ The United States appointed Hamilton Fish, Robert C. Schenck, Samuel Nelson, 
:Ebenezer R. Hoar, and George H. Williams. Great Britain appointed Earl de Grey 
and Ripon, Sir Stafford Northcote, Sir Edward Thornton, Sir John McDonald, and 
Professor Montague Bernard. 

*The United States appointed Charles Francis Adams ; Great Britain appointed 
•Sir Alexander Cockburn ; the King of Italy appointed Count Frederic Sclopis; the 
President of the Swiss Confederation named Jacob Staempfli, and the Emperor of 
Brazil the Baron d'ltazuba. J. C. Bancroft Davis was appointed agent of the 
United States, and Lord Tenterden of Great Britain. 



'^'"''•J GRANT S ADMINISTRATION. Y41 

1873.1 So -A^as settled, bj the Christian-like method of diplomacy, serious 
difficulties between two powerful nations. The Emperor of Germany^ 
to whom the question of boundary on the Pacific coast was referred,, 
decided in favor of the claim of the United States, which n-ives to our 
territory the island of San Juan, the domain in dispute. 

On the hrst of May, 1872,^ a national convention of politicians styled 
"Liberal Kepublicans," held'at Cincinnati, nominated Horace Greeley 
for President of the United States, and B. Gratz Brown for Vice-Presi- 
dent. At a convention held at Baltimore on the 9th of July, the 
" Democrats " coalesced with the " Liberal Republicans," and nominated 
the same candidates. Meanwhile a convention of " Pepublicans " had 
assembled at Philadelphia (June 5th) and nominated President Grant 
for a second term, with Henry Wilson for Vice-President. Grant and 
"Wilson were elected in the autumn by a large majority over the coalition, 
candidates. 

During President Grant's first term several important measures were, 
adopted, besides those already mentioned. < A system of weather signals 
by means of the Morse electro-magnetic telegraph was established, under- 
the superintendence of the National Signal Bureau, by wh.ich the changes 
in the weather in all parts of the republic are noted simultaneously at 
various hours of the day, and predictions given concerning those changes 
for about twelve hours ahead. This is a most important branch of the 
public service, and is especially useful to the commercial and agricultural 
interests of the country. A new apportionment in representation was. 
established, making the ratio 137,800, and giving a House of Bepresenta- 
4ives of 283 members. A new Pension Bill was passed, giving eight dol- 
lars a month to all surviving ofiicers, enlisted and drafted men and volunr- 
teers in the wars of the Revolution and of 1812, or their surviving widows^. 

'The banking firms of Drexel, Morgan & Co., Morton, Bliss & Co., and Jay- 
Cooke & Co., made a contract with the British government to pay tliis award on or 
before the 10th of September, 1873. Tlie contracting bankers, from time to time, 
bought exchange, which they deposited in comparatively small amounts and received 
coin certificates for such deposits, and purchased United States bonds. These bonds 
and coin certificates they finally exchanged with the Secretary of the Treasury for a 
single certificate for $15,500,000, which reads as follows: "It is hereby certified 
that fifteen million five hundred thousand dollars have been deposited with the- 
Treasurer of the United States, payable in gold at his office to Drexel, Morgan & , 
Co., Bliss & Co., Jay Cooke & Co., or their order." This was endorsed by an order ■ 
by these parties to pay the amount to the Britisli Minister at Washington (Sir YA-- 
ward Thornton) and the Acting Consul General at New York (E. B. Archibald).. 
The Minister and Consul endorsed it with an order to pay the amount to Hainiltopj 
Fish, Secretary of State, and he in turn endorsed it with an order to pay it to W.. 
A. Richardson, Secretary of the Treasury. This was the method of payment of the; 
award into the Treasury of the United States, without moving a dollar of coin. A 
commission was afterward appointed to distribute tlie award among the just claim- 
ants for damages. The money was immediately invested in the then new five ner 
cent, bonds of the United States of the funded loan, redeemable after tlie first aay 
of May, 1881. 



742 THE NATION. tlSTi 

At the beginning of 1875, our government was paying for petisions at the 
rate of about thirty million dollars annually. Early in 1873 the Frank- 
ing privilege was abolished, by which the mails have been relieved and 
Hioney saved for the government to the amount of two and a quarter mil- 
lion dollars annually. During that first term, an important embassy came 
from Japan (1872) to inquire about the renewal of former treaties be- 
tween our government and that. It consisted of twenty-one persons, 
composed of the heads of the several departments of the Japanese gov- 
ernment, and their secretaries. In the same year the Grand Duke 
Alexis, son of the Emperor of Russia, visited the United States. Steps 
had also been taken by the government for a celebration of the centennial 
anniversary of the national independence, by a display at Philadelphia 
of the products of all nations. This matter will be more fully mentioned 
hereafter. 

Grant and Wilson took the prescribed oath of ofiice, administered by 
Chief Justice Chase, on the 4:th of March, 1873, and the Senate imme- 
diately confirmed the President's nominations for the heads of the several 
departments.^ The future of the country apj^eared bright and prom- 
ising. There was a steady improvement in the tone of public feeling 
after the irritations caused by the Civil War, for the government, in its 
dealings with the leaders in the insurrection, had been exceedingly 
lenient.^ There was a gradual lightening of the burden of taxation' 
which that war had imposed, and recuperative energy was visible every- 
where. In January, 1875, Congress passed a law providing for the 
resumption of specie payments, suspended in 18C1, beginning with the 
redemption of legal tender notes on the first of January, 1879, silver 
coin being meanwhile substituted for fractional paper currency. 

We have noticed, on page 735, the more humane policy toward the 
Indians, inaugurated by President Grant. Owing to the unwise feature 
of that policy in treating the Indians as foreigners, keej)ing them on 

*The following named gentlemen composed the President's cabinet at the begin- 
ning of his second term of office : Hamilton Fish, Secretary of State ; William W. 
Belknap, Secretary of War; William A. Richardson, Secretary of the Treasury; 
George M. Robeson, Secretary of the Navy; Columbus Delano, Secretary of tlie In- 
terior; John A. J, Cresswell, Postmaster-General; George H. Williams, Attorney- 
General. 

"Of the thousands of the citizens of the republic who consciously and willingly 
committed "treason against the United States," according to t lie prescription of the 
National Constitution (see clause 1, section 3, Article III.), not one had been pun- 
ished for the crime, and only one offender had been indicted when this record was 
closed. That one was Jefferson Davis, the acting head of the Rebellion, who was 
released from peril by a proclamation of amnesty made by President Johnson on 
Christmas day, 1868. 

^Taxation was reduced, as compared with 1869, at the rate of $170,000,000, 
whilst the revenue had increased from $371,000,000 in 1869, to $430,000,000 in 1873. 
The exports of 1873 showed an increase, as compared with 1869, of more than 
twenty-five per cent., whilst the value of imports ]iad increased $155,000,000. 



1875.] grant's administration. 743 

reservations, and so making necessary the employment of agents and con- 
tractors, who are not always true men, that policy has not worked so well as 
■'^s friends had hoped. There exist the same causes for irritation on the part 
of the savages, and always will exist so long as the system of reservations 
and agencies is sustained.' Make the Indians citizens of the republic, and 
hold every individual responsible to the laws, and the evil will be cured. 
It is estimated that about three hundred thousand Indians are livino- within 
the domain of our republic, of whom ninety-seven thousand are civilized, 
one hundred and twenty-five thousand are semi-civilized, and seventy-eight 
thousand are wholly barbarous or savage. To reclaim these— to civilize and 
Christianize them— the most earnest efforts of the Church and State should 
be given. 

During the year 1875, there was much uneasiness observed among the Sioux 
Indians, and threatened or actual trouble with them instantly appeared. The 
dashing cavalry officer. General George A. Custer, had been sent the year 
before into the region of the Black Hills, a part of the Sioux reservation 
around the tributaries of the Yellowstone River in Dakota and Wyoming 
Territories. Custer went with a considerable military force to examine and 
report upon the features of the country and the state of affairs there. He was 
charmed with the region, and reported that it was another Florida in floral 
beauty and extremely rich in precious metals. This report excited the cupid- 
ity of miners, and very soon numbers of them appeared there. The jealousy 
and suspicions of the Sioux were thereby excited. Finall}' at near the close 
of 1874, a bill was introduced into Congress for the extinguishment of the 
Indian title to so much of the Black Hills reservation as lay within the Terri- 
tory of Dakota. This movement when reported to the leading chiefs of the 
Sioux, greatl}' irritated them for they justly regarded it as a preliminary step 
toward robbing them of their rightful domain. 

In the spring of 1875, a government geologist was sent to the Black Hills to 
make a survey of that region, under an escort of a considerable body of cav- 
alry and infantrv. The military and the surveyors excited the jealousy of the 
Sioux ; and all through the year they exhibited conspicuous signs of prepara- 
tions for hostilities. Early in 1876 a strong military force was in the region 
of the Yellowstone, so disposed in three separate columns, as to make a simul- 

'The number of reservations h ninety-two, upon which are seated about 1'50,000 
Indians. They aggregate 108,000 square miles. Of these reservatious thirty-one 
are east of the Mississippi river, aggregating 2,700 square miles. Between the 
Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains are forty-two reservations, aggregating nearly 
144,000 square miles; and upon the Pacific slope are nineteen, aggregating 20,000 
square miles. There are 40,000 Indians who have no lands awarded to them by 
treaty, but have reservations set apart upon the public lauds of t!ie republic, lo the 
number of fifteen, aggregating about 60,000 square miles. It is estimated that the 
potentially hostile tribes at this time [1888] number about 56,000. The wonder is 
that there are not more hostile Indians, when we consider the horrible injustice 
which these natives c: the cott?try have sufliered at the hands of the EuroiMjan 
races- 



744 THE NATION. [1875. 

tjineous movement upon the Sioiix, if necessary. General Alfred H. Terry was 
m chief command of the expedition. These columns were led respectively by 
Generals Terry, Crooke and Gibbon, and these forces were to form the meshes 
of a net into which they expected to ensnare the Indians, who were led by an 
able chief named Sitting Bull. 

General Custer, accompanied by Terry and his staflf, pushed across the 
country from the Missouri River toward the Yellowstone, and at the mouth of 
the Rosebud Creek they met Gibbon. It was foimd that Indians were in the 
vicinity in large numbers. General Crooke had fought them on the 17th of 
June, and as the savages were much greater in number than his own force, 
and were well armed, he had been compelled to retreat. As Custer's force 
was stronger than GKbbon's (consisting of the whole Seventh Cavalry, twelve 
companies) he was ordered to make the attack. He and Gibbon marched to 
the vicinity of the Big Horn River. Custer arrived first and discovered a 
targe Indian camp on a plain. He had been directed to await the arrival of 
Gibbon, to cooperate with him, but beheving the Indians were moving off, he 
dii-ected Colonel Reno with seven companies of the cavalry to attack at one 
point, while he dashed oflf with the remainder to attack at another point. 
Custer had a terrible fight with the savages who numbered five to one of the 
white men. With Custer perished his two brothers, a brother-in-law and 
other gallant officers. 

This sad event occurred on the 25th of Jime, 1876. The Government 
immediately ordered a large mihtaiy force into that region, to watch the 
Sioux, but the latter evaded the troops, who finally went into camp for the 
winter. Sitting Bull and his followers anticipating severe chastisement, at 
length withdrew into the British possessions. 

Dm-ing the siunmer of 1875, our government engaged in war with the Nez- 
Perc^ (Pierced-Nose) Indians, in Idaho. These Indians were peacable and had 
always been true friends to the white people, from the time when explorers were 
sent out to that region by President Jefi"erson, early in the present century. 
Their dweUing-place had always been in the beautiful and fertile Wallowa 
Valley, where they were happy and contented. About thirty years ago, the 
United States government sent an agent there to look after the Indiana As a 
consequence this measiu-e led to discontent on the part of the barbarians 
Very soon white people began to settle among them, and, as usual, after 
awhile these began to lay plans for dispossessing the Indians. Treaties were 
made with a part of the latter, providing for their settlement on a reservation, 
on the receipt from the government of a fixed annuity in exchange for their 
lands. 

Old Joseph, a veteran chief, who took no part in the treaties, refused to 
leave the Valley. To this determination his band adhered, so, also, did others of 
the non-treaty Indians. Old Joseph died and was succeeded by his son, Joseph. 
Lake his father, he, as well as his band, preferred the ancestral home and refused 
to go. President Grant, recognizing their right to remain, issued orders, in 
1873, to prevent interference with them. But he was induced to revoke thif 



^^^•^ grant's administration. 



745 



order in 1875, when the greedy white settlers, rapaciously encroached upon the 
domain of their dusky brethren. The Nez-Perc^s pleaded for justice and right; 
the United States sent troops to di-ive them from their patrimony. Just be- 
fore the time fixed for expelUng the Indians from their home, some of Joseph's 
band, exasperated by contact with the encroaching white people, murdered full 
twenty settlers. War ensued, and the distressing conflict continued from June 
until in the autumn of 1S77. The Indians, as usual, were beaten and compelled 
to make a humihating treaty of peace. These events embittered the feehnga 
of the fi-iendly Nez-Perces toward the white people, and converted them into 
passive enemies. 

We have observed that Sitting Bull and his followers fled north, and into 
the British possessions. There he remained, suUen and revengeful, an unwel- 
come refugee on the Queen's domain. Conferences with him on the part of the 
United States through appomted commissioners, to make proposals for a pacifi- 
cation, were held ; but the propositions of the commissioners were treated with 
scorn, until at about the beginning of 1880. The British autl?,jrities had given 
Sitting Bull notice, that if he should attempt to recross the border with hostile 
attitude or intentions, he would not only have the Americans, but the British, 
as his enemies. Finally, negotiations for a surrender of the barbarians were 
again opened, in 1880, and at the close of that year the Sioux chief oifered to 
surrender himself and his band. About one thousand of his followers did sur- 
render early in 1881, after having been in exile for about five years, but their 
famous leader had not given himself up at the time of the present writing, early 
in March, 1881. 

The year 1876 was distinguished by two conspicuous featurea It was the 
'' Presidential Year " — the year when the election of a President of the Re- 
public takes place. It was, also, the "Centennial Year'' of the nation, which 
was celebrated at Philadelphia, from May until November, by a marvellous ex- 
hibition of the industry and arts of many nations. The campaign for the prize 
of the Presidency opened at about the middle of June, when the Bepubhcans, 
in national convention at Cincinnati, (June 16,) nominated Ruthei'ford B. Hayes, 
of Ohio, for President, and William A. AMieeler, of New York, for Vice-Presi- 
dent. On the 27th of the same month a national convention of Democrats 
met at St. Louis, and nominated Samuel J. Tilden, of New York, for President, 
and Thomas A. Hendricks, of Indiana, for Vice-President. A most exciting 
canvass ensued, which resulted in the election of Hayes and Wheeler. 

In the political world, the Centennial Year was also distinguished by the im- 
peachment of a cabinet minister for malfeasance in office. It was Mr. Belknap, 
the Secretary of War. The trial ended early in August, with a verdict of ac- 
quittal. At about the same time the House passed a resolution for an amend- 
ment of the National Constitution, concerning popular education by pubhc au 
thority. A resolution for a similar object, offered in the Senae, was rejected 
oy that body, and the subject was deferred. At near the close of June, a joint 
resolution was adopted, providing for the issue of $10,000,000 in silver coin, iu 
exchange for legal tender paper currency; and silver soon became very plentiful 



74 U 



THE NATION 



1876. 



One of the most important events in the history of our Country occurred in 
the year 1876, namely the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia. When the 
civil war had ended, and the strength and stability of our national government 
was no longer in the category of experiments, but was a matter of absolute de- 
monstration, the citizens of the Repubhc looked back, with just pride, over the 
ninety years of their national history which had then elapsed, since the inde- 
pendence of the English-American colonies had been declared. Many felt a 
wish that the one hundreth anniversary of that event might be celebrated in an 
Appropriate manner ; and between the years 18G5 and 1870 the newspapers 
contained suggestions concerning the propriety of such a celebration. Finally 
A communication from the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia to the municipal 
authorities of that city, asking for the use of a portion of Fairmount Park for 
a centennial celebration was presented to the select Council by a member of 
Shat body. A joint committee of seven from each chamber of the city govern- 
cnent took the subject into consideration. 

This Committee proceeded to lay the subject before Congress. The Legis- 
lature of Pennsylvania resolved to ask Congress to take action in favor of an 
international celebration at the city of Philadelphia on the one hundredth birth- 
day of the Repubhc, and appointed a Committee to proceed to Washington to 
urge the matter. This committee joined the Philadelphia committee in presen- 
ting a memorial to Congress. Congi-ess took action, and provided for the 
appointment, by the President of the United States, of a Commission and 
alternate Commission from each State and Territory of the Union, who were 
to be nominated by the respective governors of the States and Tenitories. 
It also provided that the Exhibition should take place at Philadelphia. This 

act became a law on the 3d of March, 
1871. The commissioners and alternate 
commissioners met at Philadelphia on 
the 4th of March, 1872. Twenty-four 
States and three territories were repre- 
sented. They organized a United States 
Centennial Commission, by choosing 
Joseph R. Hawley, of Connecticut, 
President ; Hon. Orestes Cleveland, A. 
T. Goshom, William M. Byrd, J. D. 
Creigh, and Robert Lowry, Vice-Presi- 
dents; Lewis Wain Smith, Temporary 
Secretary ; an Executive Committee and 
a Solicitor. John L. Campbell of In- 
diana, finally became the permanent 
Sooretoiy. The oommiasioners adopted rules for their goverment, and also an 
official seal, which may be described as follows : 

In concentric circles around the edge of the seal is the title of the oganiza- 
tion — "The United States Centennial Commission." In the centre of the 
seal is a view of the State House as it appeared when the Declaration oJ 




JOSEPH R. HATTLET. 



1876.] 



ORANT^S ADMINISTRATION. 



74! 



Independence was signed in its great iiall. Beneath the building are the worda 
which were cast on the State-House bell in Colonial times, " Proclaim liberty 

THROUGHOUT THE LAND : AND TO ALL TUB 
INHABITANTS THEREOF." 

In April, 1873, a Centennial Board 
of Finance was created, of whom 
more than one-half were residents of 
Philadelphia. They were author- 
i/'^^d to issue bonds not to exceed in 
amount the sum of $10,000,000, and 
to proceed to the preparation of the 
grounds and the erection of buildinga 
in Fairmount Park. On the 4th of 
July, 1873, the Park Commissioners 
formally sm-rendered to the custody of 
the Centennial Commission, the/por- 
SEAL or THE CENTENNIAL coMMissios.i Uon of thc groimds wliich had been 

designated for the purpose. On that day the President of the United States 
issued a proclamation, announcing the fact that an " International Exhibition of 
Arts, Manufactures, and Products of the Sod and Mines," would be opened at 
Philadelphia in Aprd, 1876. The next day, July 5, 1873 the Secretary of State 
sent a note to all the foreign ministers of the United States, containing the regu- 
lations adopted by the Commission concerning exhibitors, and directing these 
ministers to call the attention of the foreign governments to the proposed 
Exhibition. Early in the summer of 1874, the President issued a cordial invi- 
tation of the United States Government to the Goverments of other nations, 
to be represented in the Exhibition, and to take part in the Centennial 





CENTENIflAL MEDAL. 



Exposition. Congress also passed an act authorizing medals, commemorating 
the one hundredth anniversary of the first meeting of the Continental 



7 IS THE NATION. [1876 

Congress, and also of the Declaration of Independence, to be struck. A 
picture of the latter is given in the engraving.* 

Grand Buildings were erected for the accommodation of the ai'ticles exhib- 
ited, at an aggregate cost of $4,444,000. They covered, with their annexes, 
about 75 acres of ground. They were five in number, namely : Main Exhibi- 
tion Building, Art Gallery, Machinery Hall, Horticultural Hall and Agricul- 
tui'al HalL Beside these many other buildings were erected by national and 
Individual exhibitors, and by several States and Territories, making the whole 
number of buildings in the Centennial grounds, 190. 

When, in the svunmer of 1875, it was found that applications for space in 
the Centennial Exhibition from foreign countries, were so numerous that under, 
the rules for classification much work done by women would be thrown out, or 
lost in the crowd of other exhibitors, a separate building for the product of 
woman's hands was suggested. A Woman's Centennial Exhibition Com- 
mittee was* formed, with Mrs. E. D. Gillespie of Philadelphia at its head, 
with able assistants in the various States and Territories. She gathered from 
the women of our country sufficient money to build and equip a magnificent 
" Woman's Pavilion," at a cost of more than $30,000. The display of the 
work of women in nearly all departments of art and industry seen in that 
building, was among the most attractive features of the Great International 
Fair. The women of our country conti-ibuted $100,000 to the funds raised 
for making preparations for the Exhibition. 

At the opening of 1876, it was found that about $1,500,000 'were yet lacking 
for the completion of the preparations, and Congress was asked to supply that 
sum. Thirty-six nations had accepted the invitation of our government to 
participate in the exhibition, and every true patriot felt that nothing should 
be wanting to make it what it had been promised to be ; and yet our people 
had the mortifying spectacle presented, of a powerful minority voting against 
the measiire. The appropriation was made, however, but with a proviso that 
the amount shoiild be refunded to the National Treasury out of the proceeds 
of the Exhibition, and it was done. The preparations were carried on vigor- 
ously to completiop., and the Exhibition was opened on the appointed day, the 
10th of May, 1876, with imposing ceremonies. Privileged ones were first ad- 
mitted and took their seats. Among them was Dom Pedro, Emperor of Brazil, 
with his Empress — the only foreign sovereign present. The President of the 
United States (General Grant) arrived at the appointed hour, when the inaugural 

' On one side is a feminine figure representing the Genius of Liberty with a sword buckled to 
her girdle, the shield of the Stars and Stripes leaning a» '•est, whilst with each hand she extends 
a welcome and a chaplet to other feminine figures, representing Art and Science, who present evi- 
dences of their skill and craft to do honor to the date, 1776, which is inscribed upon the platform. 
Around the whole are the words, "In COMMEMORATION OF THE HUNDKEDTH anniveksaky 
OF American Independknxe, " and "Act of Congress, June, 1874." On the other sidtt 
is a feminine figure representing the Genius ot America rising from a recumbent position, grasp- 
ing with her right hand the sword which is to enforce her demands, and raising her left in a[> 
pealing pride to the galaxy of thirteen stars, which, indicating the original Colonies and States, 
are blazing in the firmament. Beneath is the date 1776, and around the whole the kernel of the 
resolution for independence, in these words, " Thbsk COI ONIE8 AKK, AND OF RIGHT OCaHT TO 
BK, FREE AND INDKPENDEaiT STATES." 



^^^•1 GBANT^S ADMINI8TB1TI0N. 749 

ceremonies were begun with music by Tbeodore Thomas's orchestra. After a 
fervent invocation by Bishop Simpson of the Methodist Episcopal church, a 
thousand voices sang a beautiful " Centennial Hymn," composed by John G. 
Whittier. The buildings were then formally presented to the United States 
Centennial Commission, by the President of the Centennial Board of Finance. 
A cantata was sung, when General Hawley presented the Exhibition to the 
President of the United States. Then the American flag was unfurled over 
tLe lofty tower of the Main Exhibition Building, as a signal that the Great 
Fair had begun. 

The attendance of the Exhibition through the intense heats of that Summer 
was limited, but early in the Autumn, the number increased to an average of 
80,000 or 90,000 a day. On the "Pennsylvania Day," the number of admis- 
sions was about 275,000. The largest attendance for a full month, was in 
October, when 2,663,911 persons were admitted in thirty-one days. The 
total number of admissions from the opening until the closing, was 9,910,965* 
The total amount of cash receipts during the exhibition was $3,813,725. 

On the 4th day of July, 1876 — the Centennial day of the RepubHc — the 
Territory of Colorado was admitted into the Union as a State, making the 
whole number thirty-eight. Ten other Territories are preparing to enter ; 
and the time is probably not far distant when they will all take their places as 
commonwealths of the Republic, and other Territories will be organized. 

The result of the Presidential election was long in doubt. Each party 
claiming a majority for its candidate. One hundred and eighty-five votes ia 
the Electoral College were necessary to a choice. It was decided immediately 
after the election that Mr. Tilden had one hundred and eighty-four votes, 
while the result in South Carolina, Florida and Louisiana was doubtful 
Concerning that result there was a long and bitter contest. Representative 
men of each party went into these states to witness the coimting of the votes. 
Meanwhile pubHc excitement ran high throughout the country. In anticipa- 
tion of violence, the President took the precaution so early as the 10th of 
November, to order the United States troops in New Orleans to be in instant 
readiness to preserve the peace. The same measure was adopted in South 
Carolina. 

Charges and counter-charges of fraud were rife in the three doubtful states, 
and the subject occupied much of the attention of Congress during its session. 
The difference of opinion concerning the legal method prescribed by the Con- 
stitution, for the final opening and counting of the votes of the Electoral 
College, was so wide that it was agreed to submit the whole affair to an 
Electoral Commission to be composed of an equal number of representatives 
of each poHtical party. A committee, similarly constituted, was appointed to 
submit a bill for the purpose. They reported on the 18th of January, 1877 
The bill provided for the appointment of five members from each House, with 
five associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, four of them 
to select the fifth : the entire Commission to be presided over by the associate 
iustice longest in commission. It was agreed that their decisions should be 
final. 



750 



THB MATIOV. 



[1878. 



Aftor much stormy debate, the bill was adopted by both Houses on the 
86th; was signed by the President on the 29th, and the next day the 
commission was appointed.^ They met in the Hall of the House of Representa- 
tives, on the first of Febuary, to open and count the votes. Great care, delib- 
ation and impartiality were observed in the business, and the Commission 
did not reach their final decision until just at the close of the session, when it 
was declared that Mr. Hayes had received a majority of the Toteg ol the 
Electoral College. 



CHAPTER XXL 
Hates' Administration. [187 7—1881.] 




Rutherford B. Hayes was inaugurated the niuoteenth President of the United 
States, on Monday, the 5th of March, 1877 ; Chief-Justice Waite administering 
the usual oath of office. He named his Cabinet 
Ministers and the Senate confirmed them.' Honored 
with the confidence of the majority of both parties, 
in his integrity and ability, and with the concurrence 
of his cabinet, the President inaugurated an era of 
apparent good feeling by adopting a liberal, kind 
and conciliating policy toward the people of the 
lately disorganized but now reorganized States.^ 
A prominent featvire in his administration at the 
very beginning, was the adoption of measures for 
conciliating the feelings of the yet disaffected in 
the States in which insurrection had prevailed, 
known as his "Southern Policy." Mr. Key, of 
Tennessee, the Postmaster-General, had been a 
confederate military leader. He removed a prominent object of bitter com- 
plaiut, namely, the United States troops from Southern States, and left the 
government of affairs there in the hands of the civil authorities ; and he de- 

' The Senate elected Messrs. Edmunds, Morton, Frelinghuysen, Thurman and Bayard ; and 
the house elected Messrs. Payne, Hunton, Abbot, Garfield and Hoar. The four associate Jus- 
tices chosen, were Clifford, Miller, Field and Strong; and these chose for the the fifth, Justice 
Joseph P. Bradley. 

* These were Wm. M. Evarts, of New York, Secretary of State ; John Sherman, of Ohio, 
Secretary of the Treasury ; George W. McCrary, of Iowa, Secretary of War; Richard W. 
Thompson, of Indiana, Secretary of the Navy ; Carl Schurz, of Missouri, Secretary of th« Interior ; 
David M. Key, of Tennessee, Postmaster-General; and Charles Devins, of Massachusetta, 
Attorney-General. 

^ Rutherford Birchard Hayes, the nineteenth President of the United States, was bom in 
Delaware, Ohio, Oct 4, 1822. He \b of Scotch descent His father emigrated to Ohio from 
Vermont He was educated at Kenyon College, and graduted at the Cambridge Law School in 
1845. He practised law in Cincinnati until 1861, when he entered the Union Army as major of 
Ohio Volunteers, and served with his regiment in Western Virginia, a part of the time on the staff 
^f General Rosecraiis as Judge AdvocatK. In December 1862, he was promoted to the commau'l 



EUTHERFORD B. HATES. 



^^-^ HAYESES ADMINI8TBATI0N. 751 

clared bis intention to endeavor to bring about a more cordial union among alJ 
sections. Much has been accomplished toward that desii-able end. 

President Hayes also attempted to carry out much needed reforms in the 
Civil Service of the government, and was partially successfvd ; not so much in 
actually affecting reforms, as in opening the way to them by awakening a pub- 
lic consciousness of the necessity of such reforms. 

The XLVth Congress, at its regular session having failed to make appro- 
priations for the maintenance of the mihtary estabHshment, the sum needed 
being nearly $35,000,000, the President called an extraordinary session of the 
Congress on the 15th of October, 1878. In the House, there were 180 Demo- 
cratic, and 140 RepubHcan members, and in the Senate, 38 Repubhcans, 33 
Democrats, and 2 Independents, with 3 vacancies. The session continued 
until the opening of the regular session (Dec. 3.) The chief object for which 
the special session had been called was not accomphshed, and exciting debates 
of a partisan character occupied nearly the whole of the ensuing regular 
session. During that session, and the next, there appeared a disposition on the 
part of the opposition to block the wheels of government unless peculiar 
measures which they had proposed should become law. They passed a bill for 
almost prohibiting, by restrictive measures, Chinese emigration, in violation of 
the spiiit of existing treaties. The bill was vetoed by the President, and the 
opposition, having the power, caused Congress to fail to pass the necessary ap- 
propriation bills. 

This failui-e made a special session of Congress necessary, and the President 
convened it on the 18th of March, 1879. The opposition, having a majority 
in Congress, put upon each appropriation bill such obnoxious " riders," that the 
President felt compelled to veto them. The special session continued to July 
1, (1879), when most of the objectionable features of the several bills which 
bad been vetoed, having been removed, they became law by the signature of 
the President. An ineffectual effort was made to pass a bill, prohibiting the 
service of United States troops and of United States marshals in keeping or- 
Jer and preserving the purity of the ballot-box at elections. 

In 1879, there was a remarkable exodus of negroes from States on the lower 
Mississippi River and from the CaroUnas. The larger number, and the earlier 
emigrants went to Kansas, and later a considerable number went to Indiana. 
Congress appointed a committee to inquire into the causes of the remarkable 
exodus, but there labors were not satisfactory. 

One of the most remarkable events in our national history occurred on the 
Ist of January, 1879. It was the resumption of specie payments by the national 

of the first brigade of the Kanawha Division, in which capacity he served until the Fall of 1864. 
He had engaged in the battle of South Mountain in 1862, and he was conspicuous in the battles of 
Winchester, Fishers' Hill, and Cedar Creek, and was promoted to Brigadier General " for gallant 
service." He was four times wounded during the war, and had four horses shot under him. 
In 1864, General Hayes was elected to Congress, and served a full term. He was re-elected in 
1866, resigned in 1867, and was twice chosen Governor of Ohio, in which position he won the 
respect of all classes. In 1875, he was a third time elected Governor of Ohio, and m 1876, was 
xhosen by the Republicans, to fill the office of President of the United States. He was luaugu- 
■(rated in March, 1877. His administration was conspicuous for its purity. 



752 THE NATIOH. C1W9- 

government and the brinks, after about 18 years of suspension. It had been 
initiated in a degree, by the law of January, 1875, already mentioned. This 
measure had ever since been violently opposed by inflationists, or those who 
desired to have che government issue a limited or an unlimited quantity of 
paper currency, known as "greenbacks," because the backs of the bills were 
printed with a green color. These opposers were crystallized into a political 
party, known as the "Greenback Party." They prophesied financial ruin, or 
at least great financial embarrassment, that would foUow the act of resimiption. 
In (Spite of all opposition, and of the propbets of evil, the act of resmnption took 
place at the appointed time with the most salutary effects. The business of 
the country which had been depressed for six years, immediately improved, and 
has ever since, moved on toward uncommon prosperity in all the industries. 
Not one of the evils predicted, occurred. 

A distressing hostile outbreak of the Ute Indians occurred early in the 
autumn of 1879. They became dissatisfied with the treatment they had re- 
ceived from the national government, and were in arms. They murdered N. 
C. Meeker, the government agent, at their reservation. Major Thomburgh 
was sent with national troops to suppress the outbreak, and was fiercely at- 
tacked by the Utes on September 29. He and ten of his men were slain, and 
the remainder of his command were surrounded by the hostile barbarians, for 
sis days. The troops were intrenched and held out until succor arived. The 
Utes were soon subdued. 

A joint resolution was introduced in the Senate of the United States on Jan- 
uary 19, 1880, and in the House of Representatives, on January 30, to amend 
the national constitution to secure the elective franchise for women. The 
amendment offered was as follows : 

" Article 16. The right of Suffrage in the United States shall be based on 
citizenship, and the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not bo 
denied or abridged by the United States, or by any State, on account of sex, 
or for any reason not equally appMcable to all citizens of the United States. 

"Congress shall have power to enforce this article by apppopriate legislation." 

The project of an interoceanio canal across the isthmus which connects 
North and South America, was revived by a visit, early in 1880, from M. deLes- 
seps, the constructor of the Suez canal, who extended his journey to the isthmus. 
He announced his confidence in the feasibUity of his plan, and his intention 
to raise the funds for its construction and press forward the work speedily. 
The feelings of Americans being averse to the supreme contrcl of such a work, 
if done, by Europeans, President Hayes deemed it wise to apprise the world 
of it through a message to Congress, March 8, 1880, in which he declared that 
it is the duty of the United States to assert and maintain such supervision 
and authority over the enterprise as will protect our national interests. 

In June, 1880, national conventions of four distinct political parties, to nomi- 
nate a candidate for President of the United States, were held. The Repub- 
lican convention was held at Chicago on the 2d, when James A. Garfield, of 
Ohio, was nominated for President, and Chester A. Arthur, of New York, for 



^^^^•^ Hayes's administration. 75a 

Vice-President. The convention of the "National" or Greenback party v^a& 
held at Chicago on June 9, and nominated James B. Weaver, of Iowa, for Presi- 
dent, and Benjamin J. Chambers, of Texas, for Vice-President. The Prohibi- 
tion convention was held at Cleveland, Ohio, on the IVth of June, and nomi- 
nated Neal Dow, of Maine, for President, and A. H. Thompson of Oluo for Vice- 
President. The Democratic convention assembled at Cincinnati on June 22^ 
and nominated Winfield S. Hancock, U. S. Army, for President, and William 
H. English, of Indiana, for Vice-President. There was a fifth (anti-masonic) 
candidate for President— John W. Phelps, of Vermont. Samuel C. Pomeroy,. o£ 
Kansas, was the anti-masonic candidate for Vice-President. 

The canvass for President and Vice-President was an exciting one, and results 
ed in the choice of James A. Garfield, of Ohio, and Chester A. Arthur, of 
New York, by considerable majorities, the Republican candidates having 213. 
Electoral votes, and the Democratic candidates 156. The result of the election 
gave a powerful impulse to the business of the country, and the year 1880 closed 
with evidences of increasing and permanent material prosperity throughout th& 
Eepublic. Taxes had gradually decreased, and the burden of the pubHc debt 
has been greatly lightened, year after year, by the operation of the sound finan^ 
cial policy of the government. That debt, on the first of January, 1866, amounted,, 
in round numbers, to a little more than $2,800,000,000; at the close of 1881 it. 
was less than $1,900,000,000, or more than $900,000,000 reduction in 14 years-. 
Since 1877, the government has refunded about $850,000,000 of the public debt, 
into bonds bearing interest at the rate of four-and-a-half and four per cent, a year. So^ 
high is the public credit that these bonds are now (1881,) sought after with 
avidity and bear a considerable premium. The reduction of the annual interest 
charge on the public debt by this refunding is about $17,000,000. During: 
Hayes' administration of four years, about $209,000,000 of the pubhc debt wasi 
paid. 

A new funding bill, fixing the rate of interest at three per cent, a year, was^ 
debated for some time, and two days before the close of the 46th Congress it 
was passed, and sent to the President. On account of a very mischievous 
section, the President vetoed it the next day (March 3, 1881), and no further 
action upon it ensued. The House of Representatives also passed a new Appor. 
tionment bill, fixing the number of the members of that House at 319, in the. 
48th Congress, instead of 293, as in the present Congress. The ratio of repre^- 
sentation is increased from 131,425 under the census of 1870, to 154,764^ trades- 
the census of 1880. The Senate did not act upon it. 

General Garfield/ the President elect, left his home at Mentor, Ohio, on the 

•James A. Garfield was born in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, fifteen miles from Cleveland, Nov. 19, 1831. His 
father was a small farmer, and died when this, his youngest son, was two years of age. His widow, a woman 
of great energy and perseverance, was left with four children to support, and for many years the straggle of 
the family for a livelihood was very severe. When James was old enough he worked on the httle farm in 
Bummer, and in the winter worked at a carpenter's bench, and went to school when he could. At the age of 
seventeen, he hired out as a driver on a canal, and soon rose to the position of pilot of the boat. He finally, 
by dint of hard labor, obtained first an academic education, working at the carpenter's trade mornings and 
evenings, and teaching school in winter. He entered Williams College when he was twenty-three years old, 
became professor in a small college in Ohio, and in less than two years was its p)resident. He studied law, 
and was admitted to the bar in ISfiO, and the same year was elected to the Ohio State Senate, in which hm. 
Iras active in promoting measures for the safety of the Union. He was made colonel of Ohio Volunteers, 



^54 THE NATION. [1881. 

'28th of February, with his family. Among its members was his venerable 
mother, eighty years of age. He arrived in Washington on the first of March, 
. and on Friday, the 4th, was inaugurated the twentieth President of the United 
-States, just one hundred years after the adoption, by the Continental Congress, 
■ £>f the first constitution of the United States. The day was pleasant, and Chief - 
Justice Waite administered the usual oath of office to General Garfield, in 
the presence of fifty thousand citizens of the Republic. His inaugural address 
was dehvered in a strong, clear voice, that might be heard by many thousand 
3p«jtators. 

President Hayes had called a special executive session of the Senate to act 
upon the new President's nominations of Cabinet Ministers. They assembled 
immediately after the inauguration ceremonies were closed. On Saturday after- 
noon the President sent in the names of persons he had chosen for advisers. 
liChese nominations were confirmed without debate.' 



CHAPTER XXII. 

Garfield's Administration. 



President Garfield, in his inaugural address, promised full and equal protec- 
tion of the Constitution and laws for every citizen, irrespective of race or color; 
-advocated universal education as a safeguard of sufErage; recommended such 

• an adjustment of our monetary system " that the purchasing power of every coined 
•dollar will be exactly equal to its debt-paying power in all the markets of the 
"'world; and that the national debt should be refunded at a lower rate of interest, 

without compelling the withdrawal of National Bank notes; the prohibition of 
polygamy within the borders of our republic, and the regulation of the civil 
service by law." These were the principal points discussed in the inaugural 
address. 

At the very beginning of the new administration there was a struggle in the 
/Senate of the United States between the two great parties (Repubhcan and Dem- 
ocratic) for power in that body, each refusing to yield on the question of com- 
pleting the organization, one wishing to elect new officers of that body, the other 
^insisting upon keeping the old ones. There was a dead-lock for several weeks, 
^^^'here was also strife concerning the confirmation of nominations made by the 

• aid admirable service in eastern Kentucky in 1861. lie was appointed chief of General Rosecrans's staff in 
-a864, and rose to the rank of major-general. He was elected to Congress while in the field, and in that body 
'3ie did excellent service on the Committee on Military Affairs. General Garfield was sixteen successive years 
•a member of that body, and for some time a Republican leader. In January, 1880, he was elected to the 
^Senate of the United States, but never took his seat, for in the fall of that year he was elected Presideat of 
sthe United States. He was inaugurated March 4, 1881. He was shot by an assassin July 2, and died Sep- 
■--tcmber 19, at Long Branch, on the New Jersey shore. 

»The followinggentlemen constituted the Cabinet: James G.Blaine, of Maine, Secretary of State; Wdliam 
"Windom, of Minnesota, Secretary of the Treasury; Robert Lincoln, (son of President Lincoln,) of Illinois, 
Secretary of War; William H. Hunt, of Louisiana, Secretary of the Navy; Samuel J. Kirkwood, of Iowa, Sec- 
■ retaryof the Interior; Thomas L. James, Postmaster- General, Wayne McVeagh, of PennBylvania, Attorney- 
'Qeneroi. 



1881.] 



Garfield's administration. 



75^ 



President of the United States, of incumbents for office in the State of Neic 
York, particularly that of the collector of the port of New York. The nomine*i 
for that office, it was conceded, was thoroughly qualified to fill it, but was- pen-- 
sonally distasteful to the senior U. S. Senator (Roscoe ConkHng) from New York.-, 
and he vehemently opposed his confirmation by the Senate. Because the- Senate'; 
could not agree with him, the Senator resigned his seat, deserted his post andf 
returned home, taking with him his Senatorial colleague, so leaving the great- 
State of New York unrepresented in the Senate of the United States. Ther 
President withdrew all of the nominations for New York, excepting that for tlie 
collectorship which was immediately confirmed, and the Senate adjourned (Ma^ 
20) sine die. 

The New York Legislature was in session at 
that time, and were compelled to take immediate 
steps to fill the seats deserted by the two New 
York Senators. Mr. ConkHng had no doubt that 
he and his colleague would be immediately re- 
chosen to fill their vacated seats. He was mis- 
taken. Instead of meeting general support and 
sympathy, he encountered general opposition and 
indignation among his political friends and others 
for his unwarrantable course. Perceiving this, 
he repaired to the State capital, and there con- 
ducted, for several weeks, a most persistent per- 
sonal struggle for a re-election, but was defeated. 
His seat and that of his colleague were filled by 
the choice of two other men. This strife had 
agitated the whole nation, and in the final result the people felt great relief. 

While these personal struggles were going on at Washington and Albany, tZse 
government, which was moving on in successful progress, had confirmed impor- 
tant treaties; one with China, concerning immigration and commerce; an extra- 
dition treaty with the United States of Colombia; a consular convention witb- 
Italy, modifying and defining the judicial powers of certain consulates; aeon--, 
vention with Morocco respecting the taxation prerogatives of the Moorish Gov- 
ernment, and a treaty with Japan prescribing reciprocal duties for the Japanese- 
and United States Governments, in cases of shipwrecks upon their respective- 
coasts. On May 18, the Senate postponed the resolution asserting the "Monroe-, 
doctrine" in the case of the Isthmus Ship Canal.' 

The fearful agitation of the people by the humiliating strife for office at Albany? 
intensified the ill-feeling of disappointed office-seekers everywhere, and producecj 
its logical result. While that struggle was at its height the nation was appalled J 
by the fact that one of this dangerous class — dangerous alike to public order andi 
public virtue — had shot the President of the United States as he was about tec 
leave the national capital on a trip to New York and New England. The terri- 




GARFIELK.. 



See page 752. 



756 THE NATION. [1881. 

iAe deed was done at the station of the Bahimore & Potomac railway, in Wash- 
angfton, at about 9 o'clock on Saturday morning, July 2, 1881, where he was to 
foe joined by members of his cabinet. As he was walking through the passenger 
rroom arm-in-arm with Mr. Blaine, the Secretary of State, two pistol-shots were 
'fired in qiuck succession from behind them, and the President sank to the floor, 
bleeding profusely. Only one shot touched his body; that entered it through 
:the eleventh rib, about four inches to the right of the spine, and taking a tortu- 
ous (Course lodged some distance to the left of the lumbar vertebrae at the lower 
margin of the pancreas. It was, externally, a jagged wound, caused by a ball 
of the size known as cahbre 44. The wounded President was at first carried to 
;a room in the second story of the building where he was shot, and an hour later 
Sie was conveyed to the Executive Mansion. The assassin was instantly arrested 
Iby a police officer (Kearney), to whom he said; "I did it and will go to jail for 
^. I am a Stalwart [the political name given to the friends of Senator Conkling 
in tlie strife then going on] and Arthur will be President." In his pocket 
was found the following letter directed " To the White House": 

'"The President's tragic death was a sad necessity, but it will unite the Republican party and save the 
t«public. Life is a flimsy dream, and it matters little when one goes. A human life is of small value. Dur- 
ing the war thousands of brave boys went down without a tear. I presume the I'resident was a Christian, 
and that he will be happier in Paradise than here. It will be no worse for Mrs. Garfield, dear soul, to part 
with her husband this way than by natural death. He is liable to go at any time any way. I had no ill-will 
-toward the President. His death was a political necessity. 

"I am a lawyer, a theologian, and a politician. I am a Stalwart of the Stalwarts. I was with Gen. Grant 
cand the rest of our men in New York during the canvass. I have some papers for the press which I shall 
Seave with Byron Andrews and his co-journalists at 1,340 New York Avenue, where all the reporters tan see 
Rthem. I am going to the jail. "Charles Guiteau." 

A much shorter letter, but of similar import, was found, addressed to General 
Sherman, asking him to send troops to protect the jail. The assassin (Guiteau) 
'had been an unsuccessful office-seeker for a long time, and had led a precarious 
and disreputable life in various large cities in the Union. Soon after the arrival 
-of the ambulance, with the President, at the Executive Mansion, the Cabinet 
Ministers and their wives who had taken the cars for the journey came in haste 
t,o the "White House." Soon afterwards the gates which lead to the Executive 
Mansion were closed, and armed military sentinels silently took their places 
about the house and grounds to relieve the police force. Before he was taken 
Ifrom the station, the President, anxious about the effect of the intelligence of 
liis wounding upon his wife, who had lately recovered from severe illness, 
dictated the following note to Colonel Rockwell: 

** 3frg. Oarfleld, Elberon, Long Branch. 

The President desires me to say to you, from him, that he has been seriously hurt, how Beriouely he 
(Oaimot yet -say. He is himaelf, and hopes you will come to him soon. He Bends his love to you. 

"A. F. Rockwell." 

Mrs. Garfield left Long Branch on a special train at near two o'clock, p.m. 
When the President was told of her departure, he said, " God bless the little 
'.woman 3 " Owing to a slight accident on the road, she did not arrive at the bed- 
aide of her husband until after six o'clock. After the first nervous prostration, 
?She President's usual cheerfiilness returned. The best physicians in Washington 
-^irere in attendance upon him. "Conceal nothing from me, doctors," he said, 
^for remember I am not afraid to die." Late in the afternoon, when there were 



1881.] Garfield's administration. 757 

evidences of internal hemorrliage, he asked Dr. Bliss what the prospects were. 
The Doctor rephed, ''Your condition is very critical. I do not think you can 
live many hours." The President firmly responded, " God's will be done, Doctor} 
I am ready to go if my time is come." 

When Mrs. Garfield entered his room, all others retired. She remained fifteen 
minutes, when the surgeons were admitted. The President was conscious, but 
very weak; his pulse being 146. "There is no hope for him," said Dr. Bliss; 
"he will not probably live three hours; he may die in half an hour." But he 
revived, and with it a faint hope of his ultimate recovery. 

On the morning of the 4th of July it was thought he could not live until noon. 
The preparations for the joyous observance of the national hohday were 
abandoned in all parts of the Union, and it became a day of great solemnity 
among the people. Messages of condolence to the stricken family and to the 
nation soon came from every part of the civilized world. The frequent bulletins 
issued by the surgeons in attendance day after day were sent over the land by 
telegraph and across the sea; and hke the ebbing and flowing of the tide was the 
condition of the hopes and fears of the watching millions. Prayers ascended 
hourly from devout hearts all over Christendom, asking for the recovery of the 
President; and medical skill, science, experience, and tender ministrations of love 
were exhausted in efforts to save the precious life. The surgeons in daily and 
nightly attendance upon the sufferer were Doctors D. W. Bliss, J. K. Barnes, 
J. J. Woodward, and R. Reyburn, of Washington City, and the chief nurse was 
Mrs. Doctor Edson, of the same city. Doctors Hayes Agnew, of Philadelphia, 
and Frank H. Hamilton, of New York, were the consulting surgeons. 

The President had relapses and physical complications, but at length, early in 
September, it was hoped that he was on the sure way to recovery. Dreading 
the effects of the malaria-laden atmosphere of the vicinity of the Wliite House, it 
was resolved to remove him to Long Branch, on the borders of the sea. This 
was done by railway in the space of about seven hours, on the 6th of September, 
the cars running at the average speed of 55 miles an hour. He was lodged at 
Long Branch in an upper room of a cottage there, where from his bed he could 
look out upon the sea. He continued to improve, apparently, until he was able 
to sit up awhile in an easy chair. The way to permanent convalescence appeared 
to be assured. His Cabinet ministers were lodged close by, and were admitted 
to his presence. Only Dr. Bliss, of the regular attending surgeons in the case, 
remained with him. Dr. Bo)Titon, his family physician (who was not in the 
case), and Drs. Agnew and Hamilton were also in attendance. On Friday, Sept. 
16, he had an alarming relapse. Chills followed at intervals until Monday, and 
the physicians lost hope. At ten o'clock on Monday night Dr. Bliss inquired of 
him if he was uncomfortable. He replied with his usual cheerfulness, " Not at 
all." The Doctor retired. General Swaim, the President's warm personal 
friend, remained with him. The patient slept. Awaking suddenly, he said, 
''Swaim, I am suffering great pain here," laying his hand near his heart. "Oh, 
Swaim 1 " These were his last words. The Doctors and Mrs. Garfield were 



758 THE NATION. [1881. 

Btunmoned. He was dying, and at 10.35 p.m., Sept. 19, he drew his last breath. 
For eighty days the President had struggled for life heroically, hopefully, and 
cheerfully. 

A few minutes after his death the sad news was flashed over the Republic 
and beyond the seas. Back, from states and territories, and from all Europe, 
came quick responses of condolence and sympathy. From the Queen of England, 
who knew by her own experience how to feel for Mrs. Garfield, the brave, loving, 
hopeful wife of the President, came this dispatch : 

" Words canuot express the deep sympathy I feel for you at this terrible moment. May God support 
and comfort you as He alone can. " The Queen. ' 

'■'Balmoral Court.'''' 

Messages of condolence came from high dignitaries everywhere in Europe and 
America, and even from far-off Australia and New Zealand; and Queen Victoria 
ordered her court to wear mourning for a week in token of respect for the dead 
President. The courts of Belgium and Spain were also ordered to wear mourning. 
Immediately after the President's death, the Cabinet ministers who were present 
sent a dispatch to Vice-President Arthur, giving him the sad news, advising him to 
take the oath of office as President of the United States, "without delay," and 
inviting him to come to Long Branch the next morning. The oflBcial oath was 
administered before Mr. Arthur slept. That act was performed in his parlor by 
Judge John R. Brady, of the Supreme Court, in New York, in the presence of a 
few friends, at nearly two o'clock in the morning of September 20. President 
Arthur arrived at Long Branch the same day at about one o'clock in the after- 
noon, accompanied by Secretaries Blaine and Lincoln, and there met the other 
members of the Cabinet. 

On the next day (Wednesday, Sept. 21), the body of the dead President was 
conveyed from the ocean shore to the rotunda of the Capitol at Washington, 
where it lay in state under the great dome until noon on Friday, Sept. 23, and 
was looked upon by thousands of citizens of all classes and ages. Near the 
casket were many floral offerings; and upon its lid was placed by Victor Drum- 
mond, of the British legation at Washington, by command of his Queen, a 
beautiful wreath of flowers. A card was attached to the wreath, which read as 
follows : 

"Queen Victoria to the memory of the late President Garfield An expression of her sorrow, and 
sympathy with Mrs. Garfie'd and the American Nation. Sept. 22, 1881." 

President Arthur was formally inaugurated at Washington on the 2 2d, in the 
Vice-President's room at the Capitol. The oath of office was administered by 
Chief -Justice Waite, in the presence of members of the Cabinet, Ex-Presidents 
Grant and Hayes, General Sherman, some Senators and others, after which 
President Arthur read a brief inaugural address. The following is a copy of the 
address: 

" For the fourth time in the history of the Republic its chief magistrate has 
been removed by death. All hearts are filled with grief and horror at the 
hideous crime which has darkened our land, and the memory of the murdered 
President, his protracted sufferings, his unyielding fortitude, the example and 



1881.] 



Garfield's administration. 



759 



achievements of his life and the pathos of his deatli will forever illumine the 
pages of our history. For the fourth time the officer elected by the people and 
ordained by the Constitution to fill a vacancy so created is called to assume the 
Executive chair. The wisdom of our fathers, foreseeing even the most dire 
possibiHties, made sure that the government should never be imperiled because 
of the uncertainty of human Kfe. Men may die, but the fabric of our free 




^^"''^J^yyyy r 



CHESTER A. ARTHUR. 



institutions remains unshaken. No higher or more assuring proof could 
exist of the strength and i)ermanence of popular government than the fact 
that, though the chosen of the people be struck down, liis constitutional 
successor is peacefully installed without shock or strain, except the sorrow 
which mourns the bereavement. All the noble aspirations of my lamented 
predecessor which found expression in his life, the measures devised and 
suggested during his brief administration to correct abuses and enforce 
economy, to advance prosperity and promote the general welfare, to insure 
domestic security and maintain friendly and honorable relations with the 
nations of the earth, will be garnered in the hearts of the people, and 
it will be my earnest endeavor to profit and to see that the nation shall 
profit by his example and experience. Prosperity blesses our country; 



760 THE KATIOK. [1881 

our fiscal policy as fixed by law is well grounded and generally approved ; 
no threatening issue mars our foreign intercourse, and the wisdom, in- 
tegrity, and thrift of our people may be trusted to continue undisturb- 
ed the present assured career of peace, tranquillity, and welfare. The 
gloom and anxiety which have enshrouded the country must make repose 
especially welcome now. No demand for speedy legislation has been 
heard; no adequate occasion is apparent for an unusual session of Con- 
gress. The Constitution defines the functions and powers of the Execu- 
tive as clearly as those of either of the other two departments of the Govern- 
ment, and he must answer for the just exercise of the discretion it permits 
and the performance of the duties it imposes. Summoned to these high 
duties and responsibilities, and profoundly conscious of their magnitude 
and gravity, I assume the trust imposed by the Constitution, relying for aid 
on Divine guidance and the virtue, patriotism, and intelligence of the Ame- 
rican people." 

He then issued a proclamation designating Monday, the 26th (the day 
appointed for the funeral of the President at Cleveland, Ohio), as a day of 
fasting, humiliation, and prayer throughout the country. The next day 
(Sept. 23) the President issued another proclamation, calling a session of 
the TJ. S. Senate on Monday, October 10. 

Funeral services were conducted by Rev. Dr. Powers, of the Church of the 
Disciples in "Washington (of which the late President was a member), and other 
clergymen, on Friday, September 23, at three o'clock in the afternoon, in the 
presence of a large number of members of Congress, also of those of the Supreme 
Court, the Cabinet ministers, the diplomatic corps, officers of the Army and Navy, 
Ex-Presidents Grant and Hayes, and other distinguished persons. After this 
service the casket was borne to the hearse, adorned only by the wreath of 
flowers placed upon it by Queen Victoria, The hearse was escorted to the rail- 
way station by troops and a funeral cortege, and at about five o'clock in the 
afternoon the funeral train left Washington for Cleveland, Ohio, where it arrived 
on Saturday morning. There, beneath a catafalque in a spacious pavilion 
erected for the purpose of holding the final public funeral services, the body of 
President Garfield lay in state until about seven o'clock on Monday morning. 
The people from Northern Ohio flocked in immense numbers to Cleveland. All 
day and all night (the public square was illuminated at night by electric lights) 
the people went in and out of the pavilion, passing the coffin. They walked in 
solemn silence, four abreast. It was estimated that on Sunday nearly 10,000 
persons so passed the coffin each hour, and that the whole number who joined in 
that procession was fully 200,000. 

The gate of entrance to the pavilion was spanned by a triple arch clothed in 
black cloth, and adorned by many appropriate floral emblems. Before the outer 
face of the keystone was a floral ladder composed of white balsams, on the 
rounds of which were names indicating the progressive steps of the ascent of 
President Garfield in human greatness, — ''Chester, Hiram, WilUams, Ohio 



^^^•3 Garfield's administration. 761 

Senator, Colonel, General, Congressman, United States Senator, President, and 
Martyr." Chester was the little semmary where his education was begun; 
Hiram is the small college which will be forever identified with his name, and 
Williams is the college where he was graduated. 

On Monday, Sept. 26, the pubUc funeral services were held in the paviHon at 
Cleveland. They began at about eleven o'clock in the morning, and did not 
end, at the cemetery, until about three o'clock in the afternoon. They were 
opened by singing, and the reading of portions of Scripture by Bishop Bedell, 
of the Protestant Episcopal Church. Then followed a prayer by Rev. R. M. 
Houghton, of the Methodist Church, and an address by Rev. Dr. I. Errett, of 
Cindnnati, of the Church of the Disciples. The service closed with a prayer by 
Rev. Dr. Pomeroy. The casket was now removed to the funeral car, which was 
drawn by twelve black horses, and an immense funeral procession moved along 
Euclid avenue to the Lake View Cemetery, where the body was placed in the 
receiving vault by artillery-men, who had guarded it from the city to the place of 
burial. Within the portals of the vault were seen beautiful floral decorations. 
Among them was a lyre sent from Washington by the Brazilian legation; also 
a cross and crown sent by the Bolivian legation. The entrance to the vault 
was strewn with tender evergreens and flowers. The burial service at the vault 
Vas performed between the hours of two and three o'clock in the afternoon, 
dtiring which time there fell a copious shower of rain. When the casket was 
carried from the funeral car to the vault the only floral ornament upon it was 
the wreath of flowers placed there by Queen Victoria. This mournful journey 
was witnessed by the wife and aged mother of the deceased President from their 
carriage. The ceremonies at the Cemetery were closed with remarks by the 
Rev. Mr. Jones, who was the chaplain of General Garfield's Ohio Regiment (the 
42d) when it first entered the service in 1861. In the bosom of a knoll not far 
from the pubHc vault will be the final resting-place of the mortal remains of the 
late Chief Magistrate of the Republic. Upon that spot it is proposed to erect a 
magnificent monument to the memory of James Abpam Garfield. 



SUPPLEMENT, 



ABOIIOLES OP CONFEDERATION. 

So mAj u Jnlj, 1775, Doctor Franklin Bnbmitted to the consideraaon of CongT«u a iketeh 
of ijtiolM of Confederation between the colonies, ' limiting the duration of their Titality to tie 
time when reconciliation with Great Britain should take place ; or, in the «vent of the failure of 
that desirable result, to be perpetual. At that time, Congress seemed to have no fixed plans for 
the future— the teeming present, with all its vast and novel concerns, engrossed their whole 
attention— and Dr. Franklin's plan seems not to have been discussed at all in the National Council. 
But when a Declaration of Independence was proposed, that idea alone suggested the necessity 
of a confederation of the States to carry forward the work to a successful consummation. Con- 
gress, therefore, on the 11th of June, 1776, resolved that a committee should be appointed to 
prepare, and properly digest, a form of confederation to be entered into by the several States. 
The committee appointed under the resolution consisted of one delegate from each state.' John 
Dickenson, of Pennsylvania, was chosen chairman, and through him the committee reported a 
draft of Articles of Confederation on the 12th of July. Almost daily debates upon the subject 
ensued until the 20th of August, when the report was laid aside, and was not taken up again for 
consideration until the 8th of April, 1777. In the meanwhile, several of the States had adopted 
Constitutions for their respective government, and Congress was practically acknowledged the 
supreme head in all matters appertaining to the war, public finances, &o. It emitted bills of 
credit, or paper money, appointed foreign ministers, and opened negotiations with foreign govern- 
ments. 

From the 8th of April until the 15th of November following, the subject was debated two or 
three times a week, and several amendments were made. As the confederation might be a per- 
manent bond of union, of course local interests were considered prospectively. If the union had 
been designed to be temporary, to meet the exigencies arising from the state of war in which the 
colonies Uien were, local questions could hardly have had weight enough to have elicited debate ; 
but such was not the case, and of course the sagacious men who were then in Congress looked 
beyond the present, and endeavored to legislate accordingly. From the 7th of October until the 
15th of November, the debates upon it were almost daily, and the conflictmg interests of the sev- 
eral States were strongly brought into view by the different speakers. On that day the following 
draft, containing all of the amendments, was laid before Congress, and after a spirited debate 
was adopted : — 

Article 1. The style of this confederacy shall be, "The United States of America." 

1. Page 267. 

2. The committee consisted of Messrs. Bartlett, Samnel Adams, Hopkins, Sherman, R. R. LiTinf'-",oa 
uickenson MoKean, Stone, Melaon^ Hewea, Edward Batledge, and Qwinnett. 



j« SUPPLEMENT. 

Article 2. Each State retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, 
jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States 
in Congress assembled. 

Article 3. The said States hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each 
other for their common defense, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general wel- 
fare ; binding themselves to assist each other against all force offered to, or attacks made upon 
them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretense whatever. 

Article 4. The better to secure and perpetuate mutual friendship and intercourse among the 
people of the different States in this Union, the free inhabitants of each of these States, paupers, 
vagabonds, and fugitives from justice excepted, shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities 
of free citizens in the several States ; and the people of each State shall have free ingress and 
regress to and from any other State, and shall enjoy therein all the privileges of trade and com- 
merce, subject to the same duties, impositions, and restrictions, as the inhabitants thereof respect- 
ively, provided that such restrictions shall not extend so far as to prevent the removal of property 
imported into any State to any other State, of which the owner is an inhabitant; provided, also, 
that no imposition, duties, or restriction shall be laid by any State on the property of the United 
States, or either of them. 

If any person guilty of or charged with treason, felony, or other high misdemeanor, in any 
State, shall flee from justice, and be found in any of the United States, he shall upon demand of 
the Governor or executive power of the State from which he fled, be delivered up and removed 
to the State having jurisdiction of his offense. 

Full faith and credit shall be given in each of these States to the records, acts, and judicial 
proceedings of the courts and magistrates of every other State. 

Article 5. For the more convenient management of the general interests of the United States, 
delegates shall be annually appointed in such manner as the Legislature of each State shall direct, 
to meet in Congress on the first Monday in November in every year, with a power reserved to 
each State to recall its delegates, or any of them, at any time within the year, and to send others 
jn their stead for the remainder of the year. 

No State shall be represented in Congress by less than two, nor by more than seven members; 
and no person shall be capable of being a delegate for more than three years in any term of six 
years ; nor shall any person, being a delegate, be capable of holding any office under the United 
States, for which he, or another for his benefit, receives any salary, fees, or emoluments of any 
kind. 

Each State shall maintain its own delegates in a meeting of the States, and while they act as 
members of the committee of the States. 

In determining questions in the United States, in Congress assembled, each State shall have 
one vote. 

Freedom of speech and debate in Congress shall not be impeached or questioned in any court 
or place out of Congress ; and the members of Congress shall be protected in their persons from 
arrests and imprisonments, during the time of their going to and from, and attendance on Con- 
gress, except for treason, felon}-, or breach of the peace. 

Article 6. No State, without the consent of the United States, in Congress assembled, shall 
send any embassy to, or receive any embassy from, or enter into any conference, agreement, 
alliance, or treaty, with any king, prince, or State ; nor shall any person holding any office of 
profit or trust under the United States, or any of them, accept any present, emolument, office, or 
title of any kind whatever, from any king, prince, or foreign State ; nor shall the United States 
in Congress assembled, or any of them, grant any title of nobility. 

No two or more States shall enter into any treaty, confederation, or alliance whatever between 
them, without the consent of the United States, in Congress assembled, specifying accurately the 
purposes for which the same is to be entered into and how long it shall continue. 

No State shah lay any imposts or duties which may interfere with any stipulations in treaties 
entered into by the United States, in Congress assembled, with any king, prince, or State, in pur- 
suance of any treaties already proposed by Congress to the courts of France and Spain. 

No vessel of war shall be kept up in time of peace by any State, except such number only as 
shall be deemed necessary by the United States, in Congress assembled, for the defense of such 
State or its trade ; nor shall any body of forces be kept up by any State in time of peace, except 



ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION. ilj 

Buch number only as in the judgment of the United States, in Congress assembled, shall b© 
deemed requisite to garrison the forts necessary for the defense of such State ; but every State 
shall always keep up a well-regulated and disciplined militia, sufficiently armed and accoutered, 
and shall provide and have constantly ready for use, in pubhc stores, a due number of fleld-pieccs 
and tents, and a proper quantity of arms, ammunition, and camp equipage. 

No State shall engage in any war without the consent of the United States in Congress assembled, 
unless such State be actually invaded by enemies, or shall have received certain advice of a reso- 
lution being formed by some nation of Indians to invade such State, aud the danger is so imminent 
as not to admit of a delay till the United States, in Congress assembled, can be consulted ; nor 
shall any State grant commissions to any ships or vessels of war, nor letters of marque or reprisal, 
except it be after a declaration of war by the United States, in Congress assembled, and then 
only against the kingdom or State, and the subjects thereof, against which war has been so- 
declared, and under such regulations as shall be established by the United States, in Congress- 
assembled, unless siich State be infested by pirates, in which case vessels of war may be fitted 
out for that occasion, and kept so long as the danger shall continue, or untU the United States, 
in Congress assembled, shall determine otherwise. 

Article 7. When land forces are raised by any State for the common defense, all officers of or 
under the rank of Colonel shall be appointed by the Legislature of eacla State respectively by 
whom such forces shall be raised, or in such manner as such State shall direct, and all vacancies 
BhaU be filled up by the State which first made the appointment. 

Article 8. All charges of war, and all other expenses that shall be incurred for the common 
defense or general welfare, and allowed by the United States in Congress assembled, shall be 
defrayed out of a common treasury, which shall be supplied by the several States in proportion 
to the value of aU land within each State granted to or surveyed for any person, as such land and 
the buildings and improvements thereon shall be estimated, according to such mode as the United 
States, in Congress assembled, shall from time to time direct and appoint. 

The taxes for paying that proportion shall be paid and leyied by the authority and direction 
of the Legislatures of the several States, within the time agreed upon by the United States, in 
Congress assembled. 

Article 9. The United States, in Congress assembled, shall have the sole and exclusive right 
and power of determining on peace and war, except in the cases mentioned in the sixth article; 
of sending and receiving embassadors; entering into treaties and alliances — provided that no 
treaty of commerce shall be made whereby the legislative power of the respective States shall be 
restrained from imposing such imposts and duties on foreigners as their own people are subjected 
to, or from prohibiting exportation or importation of any species of goods or commodities what- 
soever; of establishing rules for deciding in all cases what captures on land or water shall be 
legal, and in what manner prizes taken by land or naval forces in the service of the United States, 
shall be divided or appropriated; of granting letters of marque and reprisal in times of peace ; ap- 
pointing courts for the trial of piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and establishing- 
courts for receiving and determining finally appeals in all cases of captures; provided that no 
member of Congress shall be appointed a judge of any of the said courts. 

The United States, in Congress assembled, shall also be the last resort, on appeal, in all dis- 
putes and differences now subsisting, or that hereafter may arise between two or more States 
concerning boundarj^, jurisdiction, or any other cause whatever; which authority shall always be 
exercised in the manner following: whenever the legislative or executive authority or lawful 
agent of any State in controversy with another shall present a petition to Congress, stating 
the matter in question, and praying for a hearing, notice thereof shall be given by order of 
Congress to the legislative or executive authority of the other State in controversy, and a day 
assigned for the appearance of the parties, by their lawful agents, who shall then be directed to 
appoint, by joint consent, commissioners or judges to constitute a court for hearing and determin- 
ing the matter in question; but if they can not agree, Congress shall name three persons out of 
each of the United States, and from the list of such persons each party shall alternately strike 
out one, the petitioners beginning, until the number shall be reduced to thirteen ; and from that 
number not less than seven, nor more than nine names, as Congress shall direct, shall, in the 
presence of Congress, be drawn out by lot; and the persons whose names shall be so drawn, oi 
any five of them, shall be commissioners or judges, to hear and finally determine the cont^ove^sy^ 



Iv SrPPLEMEXT. 

so always as a major part of the judg-es. who sliall hear the cause, shall agree in the determina-' 
lion ; and if either party shall neglect to attend ai the da\' appointed, without showing reasons 
which Congress shall judge sufficient, or, being present, shall refuse to strike, the Congress shall 
proceed to nominate three persons out of each State, and the Secretary of Congress shall strike in 
behalf of such person absent or refusing ; and the judgment and sentence of the court, to be 
appointed in the manner before prescribed, shall be final and conclusive ; and if any of the parties 
sliall refuse to submit to the authority of such court, or to appear, or to defend their claim or 
■cause, the court shall nevertheless proceed to pronounce sentence or judgment, which shaU in 
like manner be final and decisive — the judgment or sentence and other proceedings Ijcing in either 
case transmitted to Congress, and lodged among the acts of Congress for the security of the 
parties concerned ; jirovided that every commissioner, before he sits in judgment, shall take an 
oath, to be administered by one of the judges of the Supreme or Superior Court of the State, 
where the cause shall be tried, " well and truly to hear and determine the matter in question, 
according to the best of his judgment, without favor, affection, or hope of reward;" provided, also, 
that no State shall be deprived of territory for the benefit of the United States. 

All controversies concerning tlio private right of soil, claimod under different grants of two or 
more States, whose jurisdiction as th6y may respect such lands, and the States which passed 
3uch grants are adjusted, the said grants or either of them being at the same time claimed to have 
originated antecedent to such settlement of jurisdiction, shall, on the petition of either party to 
the Congress of the United States, be finally determined, as near as may be, in the same manner 
as is before prescribed for deciding disputes respecting territorial jurisdiction between different 
States. 

The United States, in Congress assembled, shall also have the sole and exclusive right 
and power of regulating the alloy and value of coin struck by their own authority or by that of 
the respective States ; fixing the standard of weights and measures throughout the United States ; 
regulating the trade and managing all aflairs with the Indians not members of any of the States — 
provided that the legislative right of any State within its own limits be not infringed or violated; 
establishing and regulating post-offices from one State to another throughout all the United 
States, and exacting such postage on the papers passing through the same as may be requisite to 
defray the expenses of the said office ; appointing all officers of the land forces in the service of 
the United States, excepting regimental officers ; appointing all the ofiicers of the naval forces, 
and commissioning all ofBcers whatever in the service of the United States ; making rules for the 
government and regulation of the said land and naval forces, and directing their operations. 

The United States, in Congress assembled, shall have authority to appoint a committee to sit 
in the recess of Congress, to be denominated " a Committee of the States," and to consist of one 
delegate from each State ; and to appoint such other committees and civil officers as may be 
necessary for managing the general afiairs of the United States under their direction; to appoint 
one of their number to preside, provided that no person be allowed to serve in the oflSce of 
President more than one year in any terra of three years ; to ascertain the necessarj'^ sums 
of money to be raised for the service of the United States, and to appropriate and apply the 
same for defraying the public expenses ; to borrow money or emit bills on the credit of the 
United States — transmitting every half year to the respective States an account of the sums of 
money so borrowed or emitted ; to build and equip a navy ; to agree upon the number of land 
forces, and to make requisitions from each State for its quota, in proportion to the number of 
white inhabitants in such State, which requisition shaU be binding, and thereupon the Legis- 
lature of each State shall appoint the regimental officers, raise the men, and clotlie, arm, and 
equip them, in a soldier-like manner, at the expense of the United States ; and the officers and 
men so clothed, armed, and equipped, shall march to the place appointed, and within the time 
agreed on by the United States, in Congress assembled ; but if the United States, in Congress 
assembled, shall, on consideration of circumstances, judge proper that any State should not raise 
men, or should raise a smaller number than its quota, or that any other State should raise a 
greater number of men than the quota thereof, such extra number shall be raised, ofiScered, 
clothed, armed, and equipped, in tlie same manner as the quota of such State, unless the Legis- 
lature of such State shall judge that such extra number can not be safely spared out of the 
same ; in which case they shall raise, officer, clothe, arm, and equip, as many of such extra num- 
■ber as they judge can be safely spafed. And the officers and men so clothed, armed, and 



ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION. y 

equipped, shall march to the place appointed, and within the time agreed on by the United 
States, in Congress assembled. 

The United States, in Congress assembled, shall never engage in a war, nor grant letters of 
marque and reprisal in time of peace, nor enter into any treaties or alliances, nor coin money, nor 
regulate tlie value thereof, nor ascertain the sums and expenses necessary for the defense and 
welfare of the United States, or any of them, nor emit bills, nor borrow money on the credit of 
the United States, nor appropriate money, nor agree upon the number of vessels of war to 
be built or purchased, or the number of land or sea forces to be raised, nor appoint a commande- 
in-chief of the army or navy, unless nine States assent to the same ; nor shall a question on any 
other point, except for adjourning from day to day, be determined unless by the votes of 
a majority of the United States, in Congress assembled. 

The Congress of the United States shall have power to adjourn to any time within the year, 
and to any place within the United States, so that no period of adjournment be for a longer 
duration than the space of six months; and shall publish the journal of their proceedings 
monthly, except such parts thereof relating to treaties, alliances, or military operations, as 
in their judgment require secresy ; and the yeas and nays of the delegates of each State on any 
question, shall be entered on the journal when it is desired by any delegate ; and the delegates of 
a State or any of them, at his or their request, shall be furnished with a transcript of the said 
journal, except such parts as are above excepted, to lay before the Legislatures of the several 
States. 

Article 10. The committee of the States, or any nine of them, shall be authorized to execute, 
in the recess of Congress, such of the powers of Congress as the United States, in Congress 
assembled, by the consent of nine States, shall from time to time think expedient to vest them 
with; provided that no power be delegated to the said committee, for the exercise of which, by 
the articles of confederation, the voice of nine States, in the Congress of the United States 
assembled, is requisite. 

Article 11. Canada, acceding to this confederation, and joining in the measures of the United 
States, shall be admitted into, and entitled to, all the advantages of this union; but no other 
colony shall be admitted into the same, unless such admission be agreed to by nine States. 

Article 12. All b'Us of credit emitted, moneys borrowed, and debts contracted, by or under 
the authority of Congress, before the assembhng of the United States, in pursuance of the present 
confederation, shall be deemed and considered as a charge against the United States, for 
payment and satisfaction whereof the said United States and the pub he faith are hereby solemnly 
pledged. 

Article 13. Every State shall abide by the decision of the United States, in Congress 
assembled, on all questions which, by this confederation, are submitted to them. And the 
articles of this confederation shall be inviolably observed by every State, and the Union shall be 
perpetual ; nor shall any alteration at any time hereafter be made in any of them, unless such 
alteration be agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and be afterward confirmed by the 
Legislature of every State. 

Congress directed these Articles to be submitted to the Legislatures of the several States, and, 
if approved of by them, they were advised to authorize their delegates to ratify the same 
in Congress, by affixing their names thereto. 

Notwithstanding there was a general feeling that something must be speedily done, the State 
Legislatures were slow to adopt the Articles. In tlie first place, they did not seem to accord with 
the prevailing sentiments of the people, as set forth in the Declaration of Independence ; and in 
many things that Declaration and the Articles of Confederation were manifestly at variance. The 
former was based upon declared right ; the foundation of the latter was asserted power. The 
former was based upon a superintending Providence, and the inalienable rights of man ; the lat- 
'ter resting upon the " sovereignty of declared power ; one ascending from the foundation of 
human government, to the laws of nature and of nature's God, written upon the heart of man ; 
tlie other resting upon the basis of human institutions, and prescriptive law, and colonial char- 
ters."' Agam, the system of representation proposed was highly objectionable, because each 

1. John Quincy Adams's Jubilee Discourse, 1839. 



VI 



SUPPLEMENT. 



State was entitled to the same voice in Congress, whatever might be the difference in populatioo. 
But the most objectionable feature of all was, that the limits of the several States, and also in 
whom was vested the control or possession of the crown-lands, was not only unadjusted, but 
wholly unnoticed. These and other defects caused most of the States to hesitate, at first, to 
adopt the Articles, and several of them for a long time utterly refused to accept them. 

On the 22d of June, 1778, Congress proceeded to consider the objections of the States to the 
Articles of Confederation, and on the 27th of the same month, a form of ratification was adopted 
and ordered to be engrossed upon parchment, with a view that the same should be signed by 
such delegates as were instructed so to do by their respective Legislatures. 

On the 9th of July, the delegates of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecti- 
cut, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and South Carolina signed the Articles. The delegates 
from New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland were not yet empowered to ratify and sign. Georgia 
and North Carolina were not represented, and the ratification of New York was conditioned that 
all the other States should ratify. The delegates from North Carolina signed the Articles on the 
21st of July ; those of Georgia on the 24tli of the same month ; those of New Jersey, on the 26th 
of November; and those of Delaware, on the 22d of February and 5th of May, 1779. Maryland 
stiU firmly refused to ratify, until the question of the conflicting claims of the Union and of th* 
separate States to the crown-lands should be fully adjusted. This point was finally settled by 
cessions of claiming States to the United States, of all unsettled and unappropriated lands for the 
benefit of the whole Union. This cession of the crown-lands to the Union originated the Terri- 
torial system, and the erection of the Northwestern Territory into a distinct government, 
similar to the existing States, Imving a local legislature of its own. The insuperable objection 
of Maryland having been removed by the settlement of this question, her delegates signed the 
Articles of Confederation on the first day of March, 1781, four years and four months after they 
were adopted by Congress.' By this act of Maryland, they became the organic law of the Union, 
and on the 2d of March Congress assembled under the new powers. 

1. The following are the names of the delegates from the several States appended to the Articles of Confederation:-' 

Iffw Hampshire^ Josiah Bartlett, John Wentworth^ Jr. 

Massachusetts Bay, John Hancock, Samuel Adams, Elbridge Gerry, Francis Dana, James Lovell, Samuel Holten. 

Rhodt Island, William Ellery, Henry Marchant, John ColUns. 

Connecticut, Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, Oliver Wolcott, Titua Hosmer, Andrew Adams. 

JVew York, James Duane, Francis Lewis, William Duer, Gouverneur Morris. 

Jfew Jerset/, John Witherspoon, Nathaniel Scudder. 

Pennsylvania, Robert Morris, Diiniel Roberdeau, Jonathan Bayard Smith, William Clingai, Joseph Reed. 

Delaware, Thomas McKean, John Dickenson, Nicholas Van Dyke. 

Maryland, John Hanson, Daniel Carroll. 

Virginia, Richard Henry Lee, John Banister, Thomas Adams, John Harvie, Francis Lightfoot Lee. 

North Carolina, John Penn, Cornelius Harnett, John Williams. 

Scmth Carolina, Henry Laurens, William Henry Drayton, Jonathan Matthews, Richard HutsoB, Thomas Hejward, J« 

Otergitt, John Walton, Edward TelC»ir, Edward Langworthy. 



11. 



THE NATIONAL CONSTITUTION.^ 




Wb the People of the United States,* in order to form a more perfect Union, establish Jnstfc^ 



1. In U53, the writer made a very careful copy of the Constitution of the United States, from the original in the State Department nt 
Washington City, together with the autographs of the mi-mbers of the Convention who signed it. In orthography, capital letters, and puDC- 
taation, the copy here given may be relied upon as correct, it having been subsequently carefully compared with a copy poblished by Mr» 
Hickey, in his useful little volume, entitled M« CorulitiUion oftht United Stales of America, etc., and attested, on the 20th of July, 1846, by^ 
Nicholas P. Trist, Chief Clerk of the State Department, 

The most prominent American writers upon constitutional law, are the late Justice Story and Chancellor Kent Joseph Story was born at 
Marblehead, Massachusetts, in September, 1779, and was educated at Harvard University. He studied law ; and soon, on entering upon his 
practice, took a prominent position. He was a member of hia State Legislature, and of the National Congress, and was chiefly instrumental ia 
effecting the repeal of the Embargo Act (page 403). He was only thirty-two years of age when President Madison made him an associate of 
the Supreme Court of the United States. From that time he discarded poliiics. In commercial and constitutional law he was peerles*. Hl» 
CommerUariei on the ConetittUion of the United States, published in three volumes, in 1833, will ever be a standard work. Judge Story disd at 
Cambridge, Massachusetts, Id September, 1845, at the age of sixty-six years. His own words, applied to another, may be appropriately said, 
of him : " Whatever subject he touched was touched with a master's hand and spirit. He employed his eloquence to adorn his learning, and 
his learning to give solid weight to his eloquence. He was always instructive and interesting, and rarely without producing an Instantaneous 
conviction. A lofty ambition of excellence, that stirring spirit which breathes the breath of Heaven, and pants for immortality, sustained his. 
genius in its perilous course." 

8> Preyions to the Beyolution, there were three forms of government la the Coloniu, namely Charter, Proprietary, and Trovineial, Ttm 



y^ SUPPLEMENT. 

insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote 
Olff^ct*. the general "Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves 

and our Posterity,' do ordain and establish this Constitution for the 
United States of America. 

ARTICLE I. 

Section 1. All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Con- 

JLeffUlative Powers, gress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of 

Representatives.'' 

Section 2. The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second 

Year by the People of the several States, and the Electors in each State 

JRWM ofRepreamta- gj^^jj Yia,\Q the Qualifications requisite for Electors of the most numerous 

Branch of the State Legislature.' 

No' Person shall be a Representative who shall not have attained to the Age of twenty-five 

Years, and been seven Years a Citizen of the United States, and who shall 

^"^Zntativ^^^^'' not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State' in which he shall be 

chosen.* 

Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may 

be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, 

Apportionrnmto/Hep- which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, 

resentatives. including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indiana 

not taxed, three-fifths of all other Persons.^ The actual Enumeration shall 

be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and 

within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct. The 

Number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand ; but each State shall 

have at Least one Representative ; and until such enumeration shall be made, the State of New 

Hampshire shall be entitled to chuse three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode Island and Providence 

Plantations one, Connecticut five. New York six. New Jersey four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware 

one, Maryland six, Virginia ten, North Carolina five. South Carohna five, and Georgia three.® 

When vacancies happen in the Representation from any State, the Execu- 
tive Authority thereof shaU issue "Writs of Election to fill such Vacancies. 
Speaker, haw The House of Representatives shaU chuse their Speaker and other Offi- 

app^nted. cers ; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment. 

Section 3. The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two 
^fi^ome^TtatZ* Senators from each State, chosen by the Legislature thereof, for six Years ; 
and each Senator shall have one Vote.' 

dh«rt«r govemmeiita were Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, They had power to umke lawa not mcoDsistent with those of Eng- 
laacl. The- proprietary governments were Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Delaware. Their governors were appointed by their proprietors, and 
fhnwf mni the proprietors usually made the laws. The provincial were New Hampshire, New York, New Jersey, Virginia, North Carolina, 
Sffitb Carolina, and Georgia. In these the governor and hia council were appointed by the crown, and these, with chosen representatives of 
ttc people, made the laws. 

The Union is older than the Constitution. It was formed in the first Continental Congress (page 228), by the representatives of thirteen 
npoate but not independent nor sovereign provinces, for they had ever been subject to the British crown. Then the inhabitants of those 
c»1onie» were solemnly leagued as one people, and two years later (see page 252) they declared themselves collectively independent of 
Gnat Britain, and recognized the supremacy of the Continental Congress as a central government. See Curtis's Ilialory of the Constitvlion, i. 
39^401. The plan of independent Stale governments then adopted huviug failed, a national one was formed, and the framera of the Constitu- 
tSoOjtogive-emphasia to the fact, said in the preamble of the Instrument, "We the people of the United States," instead of "We the peopl* 
«f Meaaachusetts, New York," et cetera. So argued the Supreme Court. See Wkeaton's S. C. RepoHe, i. 301. 

I* Six objects, it ia seen, were to be obtained, each having a national breadth of purpose. 

1. The members of the House of Representatives are elected to seats therein fur two years, and they hold two regular sessloui or alttiDgi 
•Anfng-that time. Each full term is called a Congress. Senators are elected by the State legialatures, to serve for six years. 

a. There ia a Senate and House of Representativea, or Assembly, in each State. Any person qualified to vote for a member of bii Stata 
JUacmhIy, may vote for a member of the National House of Representatives. 

4. A person born in a foreign country, may be elected a representative after he has been for seven years a citizen of the United States. 

5. It has been dei;ided that this does not restrict tlie power of imposing direct taxes, to States only. The Congress of the Cnitea 6late« 
las power to do so, but only for the purpose of paying the national debts and providing for the national welfare. See Kent's Commemariet 
•u-rtf Constitution, abridged edition, page 330. Direct taxes had been laid three times by the National Congress, previous to the Great Ul'vil 
Wsu- that broke out in 1S61, namely, in 1198, 1813, and 1815. The "other persona" here mentioned were slaves. In making the apportlon- 
m«it, every five slaves were accounted three persons. The Thirteenth Amendment of the Constitution (see page 756) renders this sentence s 
*=«i letter. 

£. The apportionment is made as soon aa practicable after eich enumeration of the inhabitants ia completed. The ratio based on the cen- 
ooaof 1790, was one Representative for every 33,000 persons. The ratio according to the census of 1360, was one for every 127,316 peraons. 

1. This gives perfect equality to the States, in one portion of the legislative branch of the Government. The small CVites of Rhode laUad 
and Delaware have as much power in the National Senate as the large ones of New York and Ohio. 



THE XATIOXAL CONSTITUTION. [^ 

Immediately after they shall be assembled in Consequence of the first Election, they sliall ba 
divided as equally as may be into three Classes. The Seats of tlie Senators 
of the first Class shall be vacated at the E.xpiration of the Second Year, of classification «f 
the second Class at the Expiration of the fourth Year, and of the third Class Senatorn. 

at the Expiration of the sixth Year, so that one third may be chosen every 
eecond year;i and if Vacancies happen by Resignation or otherwise, during the Recess of tl* 
Legislature of any State, the Executive thereof may make temporary Appointments until the next 
Meeting of the Legislature, which shall then fill such Vacancies. 

No person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the age of 
thirty Years, and been nine Years a Citizen of the United States,' and who Qualification of 
^haU not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that State for which he shall be Senators. 

chosen. 

The Vice-President of the United States shall be President of the Senate, 
but shall have no Vote, unless they be equally divided.^ ^''^'t^fsenftT'^ 

The Senate shall choose their other Officers,'' and also a President pro 
tempore, in the absence of the Vice-President, or when he shall exercise the 
Office of President of the United States. 

The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments:* "When Senate a court for 
sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath, or Affirmation. When ^'"'"^ ""^ impeachmsntt. 
the President of the LTnited States is tried, the Chief-Justice shall preside : 
and no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two thirds of the Members 
present. 

Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to J^idgmenfinca««ef 
removal from Office, and Disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of *^""'' "'"' 

Honor, Trust, or Profit under the LTnited States : but the party convicted 
shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment, and Punishment, acconJ— 
ing to Law.® 

Section 4. The Times, Places, and Manner of holding Elections for Sen- 
ators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legis- Mecti&ns ofSenatmt 
lature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such *'"■*' Bepresentative*. 
Regulations, except as to the places of chusing Senators.'' 

The Congress shall assemble at least once in every Year, and such 
meeting shall be on the first Monday in December, unless they shall by Law Meeting of Congrttit^ 
appoint a different day.® 

Section 5. Each House shall be the Judge of the Elections, Returns, and Qualifications of its= 
own Members, and a Majority of each shall constitute a quorum to do 
Business; but a smaller Number may adjourn from day to day, and may Organization <f 
be authorized to compel the Attendance of absent Members, in such man- Congress. 

ner, and under such Penalties as each House may provide. 

Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings, punish its 
Members for disorderly Behaviour, and, with the Concurrence of two thirds^ Rule« of proceeding 
expel a Member. 

Each House shall keep a Journal of its Proceedings, and from time to Journal of Congrest. 
time publish the same,^ excepting such Parts as may in their Judgment 

1. This ia a wise provision. It leaves representatives of the people in that branch, at all times, familiar with the legislation thereof; aod 
therefore more eCBcient than if an entirely new delegation should be chosen at the end of six years. 

5. This was to allow a foreign-born citizen to make himself familiar with our institutions, before he should be eligible to a seat in tliji 
highest legislative hall. 

3. He is not a representative of any State. By this arrangement, the equality of the States is preserved. 

4. Secretary, clerk, aergeant-at-arms, door-keeper, and postmaster. 

5. The House of Representatives, it will be observed, accuse the alleged offender, and the Senate constitutes the court whereia ke is trin*. 

6. This was a modification of the British Constitution, giving greater exclusive jurisdiction to the National Judiciary. In Great Britain, 
the House of Commons accuses, and the House of Lords (answering to our Senate) tries the offender. The latter is also invested with power 
to punish in every form known t« the laws, by ordering the infliction of fines, imprisonments, forfei ure of goods, banishment, and death. 

7. This provision was to prevent the mischief that might arise at a time of intense party excitement, when the very existence of the 
National Congress might be at the mercy of the Stale Legislatures. The place of choosing the Senators is where the SUte Legislatuie shall 
be in session at the time. 

S. This secured an annual meeting of tie National Legislature beyond the control of State legislation. The second, or laet MMi<n of every 
I'ongreas (note 3, page 366), expires at twelve o'clock at noon on the 4th of March. 

9. The object is to preserve, for the use of the sovereign people, and make public for their benefit, every «ct of I 



X SUPrLEMENT. 

require Secresy;' and the Teas and Nays of tlie Members of either House on any question shall, 
git the Desire of one fifth of those Present, be entered on the Journal." 

, ,. ^ . Neither House, during the Session of Congress, shall, without the Con- 

-Aajoiimmsnt of r> i i n /. o > i 

£ongr.e8i. sent 01 the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to any other Place 

than that in which the two Houses shall be sitting.' 
Action G. The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services. 
to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States.* 
CempensaUon and They shall in all cases, except Treason, Felony, and Breach of the Peace, be 
privileges o/members. privileged from Arrest during, their Attendance at the Session of their re- 
spective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same ; and for any 
Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other place.^ 

No Senator or Representative shall, during the time for which he was elected, be appointed 

to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States, which shall have 

J>lwrality of offices been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been increased during 

jprohiUted. gm>i^ ^^jj^g . ^nd no Person holding any office under the United States, shall 

be a Member of either House during his Contmuance in office."^ 

Section 7. All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of 
BilU, how originated. Representatives : but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments 
as on other Bills.'' 
Every Bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate, suuU, before 
it become a La vv, be presented to the President of the United States : if he 
How UUshecome. approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall return it, with his Objections, to 
that House in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the Objections 
at large on their Journal, and proceed to reconsider it." If, after such Reconsideration, two thirds 
•of that House shall agree to pass the Bill, it shall be sent, together with the Objections, to the 
■other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that 
House, it shaU become a Law. But in all such Cases the Votes of both Houses shall be deter- 
smined by Yeas and Nays, and the Names of the Persons voting for and against the Bill shall be 
entered on the Journal of each House respectively. If any Bill shall not be returned by the 
President within ten Days (Sunday excepted) after it shall have been presented to him, the 
Same shall be a Law, in like Manner as if he had signed it, unless the Congress by their Adjourn- 
ment prevent its Return, in whicli Case it shall not be a Law. 

Every Order, Resolution, or Vote to which the Concurrence of the Senate and House of 
Representatives may be necessary (except on a question of adjournment), 
Approval and veto shah be presented to the President of the United States; and before the 
powers 0/ President. Same shall take Effect, shaU be approved by him, or being disapproved by 
him, shall be repassed by two thirds of the Senate and House of Representa- 
tives, according to the Rules and Limitations prescribed in the Case of a Bill' 
Section 8. The Congress shall have power — 
tPoioers nested in To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts, and Excises ; to pay the Debts 

Congress. g^^^ provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United 

States; but all Duties, Imposts, and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States; ^^ 

1. There are occasioaa when the public good requires secret legislation, and a withholding fr.im the people a knowledge of measures dis- 
•cusaed »Ba adopted In Congress, as in a time of war, of insurrection, or of very important diplomatic negotiations. 

2. The object of this is to make a permanent record of the votes of members, so that the constituents of each may know their action on 
Sraportast ■questions. It is a salutary regulation. 

3. This 'is to prevent a majority, in either House, from interrupting, for more than three days, the legislation of Congress. 

4. Formerly the members were paid a certain amount per day, with n specified amount for each mile traveled in going to and returning 
4Vora the National capital. The present compensation is a filed sum for each Congress, with mileage. 

5 This was to prevent the interruption of their duties, during the session of Congress, and to give them perfect freedom of speech. 

6. This serves as a check to the increase of the power of the eiecutive over the legislative department of the Government, by the mean. 
•rS appointment to office. It prevents wide-spread political corruption. A person holding an office, when elected to Congress, is compelled to 
B-csign it before he can tike his seat. 

7. The members of the House of Representatives are more immediately elected by the people, and are supposed to better understand the 
"ivishea «nd wants of their constituents, than those of the Senate. The Senate, being the representative of the equality of the States, staudj 
.^■< a check to legislation that might impose too heavy taxation on the smaller States. 

a This power is given to the President to arrest hasty or unconstitutional legislation, and to operate as a check on the encroachment on the 
frights asd powers of one department over another, by legislation. It is not absolute, as the context shows, as it may be set aside by a vote of 
ffiwo thirds of the members cf the Senate and House "f Representatives, who passed it. 

9. This requirement is made that Congress may not pass, with the name of order, resolution, or vote, what, as a bill, the President has 
already vetoed, as his method of returning a bill, with his objections, is called. 

JO. The power of Congress to (ay and collect dutiti, Ac, for national purposes, extends to the District of Columbia, and to the TerritoriM 



THE NATIONAL CONSTITUTION. 

To borrow Money on the credit of the United States ;' 

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the 
Indian tribes ;" • 

To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization,' and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankrupt 
cies * throughout the United States ; 

To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of 
"Weights and Measures ; * 

To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United 
States ; 

To establish Post Offices and Post Roads ; 

To promote the progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors 
and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective "Writings and Discoveries • ° 

To constitute Tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court ; 

To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Ofiences against 
the Law of Nations ; ' 

To declare "War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures 
oil Land and Water ; 

To raise and support Armies ; but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer 
Term than two Years ; 

To provide and maintain a Navy ; 

To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the Land and Naval Forces • 

To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrec- 
tions, and repel Invasions; 

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the Militia, and for governing such Part 
of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States — reserving to the States respect- 
ively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to tha 
Discipline prescribed by Congress ; ° 

To exercise exclusive Legislation in aU Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding 
ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become 
the Seat of the Government of the United States,* and to exercise like Authority over all Places 
. purcliased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erec- 
tion of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, Dockyards, and other needful Buildings ; — And 

To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the fore- 
going Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United 
States, or in any Department or Officer thereof. 

Section 9. The Migration or Importation -of such Persons as any of the Immigrants, h/rw 
States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by a mt e . 

o' the United States, as well as to the States ; but Congress is DOt bound to extend a direct tax to the District and Territories. The stipnla- 
-tion that the taxes. &c., shall be uniform throughout the United States, is to prevent favors being shown to one State ors£ction of the Repub- 
lic, and not to .-mother. 

1. This was to enable the Government to provide for its expenses at a time of domestic insurrection or a foreign war, when the lource* 0/ 
revenue by taxation and impost, might be obstructed. 

2. This power was lacking, under the Articles of Confederation. It is one of the most important powers delegated by the people to their 
representatives, for it involves national development and prosperity. 

3. The power of naturalization was posseGsed by each State under the Confederation. There was such want of uniformity of laws on the 
«ubjoct, that confusion was already manifested, when the people, by the Constitution, vested the power exclusively in Congress. Thus * 
State is prohibited from discouraging emigration, or casting hinderances in the way of obtaining citizenship. By « recent decision of the 
Attorney-General of the Republic, every person born within its borders is entitled to the rights of citizenship. It is a birthright 

4. Since the adoption of the Constitution of the United States, a State has authority to pa«s a bankrupt law, provided such law does not 
impair the obligations of contracts within the meaning of the Constitution (art. i, sec. 10), and provided there be no act of Congress in force 
to establish a uniform system of bankruptcy conflicting with such law. 

6. This was to insure uniformity in the metallic currency of the Republic, and of weights and measures, for the beneflt of the people Im 
commercial operations. 

6. The first copy-right law was enacted in 1790, on the petition of David Ramsay, the historian, and others. A copy-right, or pateat-rlfbt 
to an invention, is given for a specified time. A copy-right is granted for 88 years, and a renewal for H years. Patents are granUd for 11 
years, without the right of extension. 

7. Congress has power to provide for the punishment of offences committed by persons on board of an American ship, wherever th»t ship 

8. Clauses II to 16 inclusive, define the war powers of the Government, such as granting licenses to privateers (see page 377. and note 6, 
page 641), raising and supporting armed forces on land and sea, calling out the militia, Ac. See Article II. of the AmendmenU to thl» CoD- 
atitution. These powers, used by the hand of an eflii lent and judicious Executive, are quite sufficient. The President csnnot eiercis* any of 
them, until the power is given him by Congress, when he is bound by his oath to take care that all the laws aball be executed. 

». Congress has auhority to impose a direct tax on the District of Columbia (not* I, page 383), in proportion to the census dlrecUd bjr tk* 
CoBstitution to be taken. 



Xii SUrPLEMENT. 

the Congress prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eiglit, but a Tax or Duty may be 
imposed on sueh Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each Person.^ 

The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus^ shall not be suspended^ 
Edbeas Corpus. unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may 
require it. 
Attainder. j^o Bill of Attainder^ or ex post Facto law shall be passed/ 

No Capitation, or other direct, Tax shall be laid, unless in Proportion to 
Taxei. ^\^Q Census or Enumeration herein before directed to be taken.' 

No Tax or Duty shall be laid on articles exported from any State. 
No Preference shall be given by any Regulation of Commerce or 
Begulatiom regard- Revenue to the Ports of one State over those of another ; nor shall Vessels 
ing u es. bound to, or from, one State, be obliged to enter, clear, or pay Duties in 

another.® 

No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Ap- 
Money, how drawn, propriations made by law ; and a regular Statement and Account of the 
Receipts and Expenditures of all public Money shall be published from time 
to time.' 

No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States : And no 
Titles of nobility Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the 
prohibited. Consent of the Congress, accept of any Present, Emolument, Office, or Title, 

of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or Foreign State." 
Section 10. No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation ; grant Letters 
of Marque and Reprisal ; coin Money ; emit Bills of Credit ; make any Thing 
Powers of States but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts ; pass any Bill of 
defined. Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, 

or grant any Title of Nobility. 
No State shall, without the Consent of the Congress, lay any Imposts or Duties on Imports or 
Exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing its inspection Laws : and the 
Met Produce of all Duties and Imposts, laid by any State on Imports or Exports, shall be for the 
Use of the Treasury of the United States ; and aU such Laws shall be subject to the Revision 
and Controul of the Congress. 

No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, oi 
Ships-of-War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with 
a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will 
not admit of Delay.* 

ARTICLE II. 

Executive power, in SECTION 1. The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the 
whom vested.' United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of 

1. The object of this clause was to end the slave-trade, or the importation of negroes from Africa, to become slaves in the United States, 
after the first of January, 180S. The Articles of Confederation allowed any State to continue the traffic indefinitely, for the States were inde- 
pendent of each other, and the organic law was silent on the subject. The importation of slaves after the beginning of ISOS, was prohibited 
under severe penalties by ihe Act of March 2, 1807. Acts on the subject have since been passed by Congress from time to time. That of 1820 
declared the foreign slave-trade to be piracy. In July, 1862, Congress made provisions for carrying into effect a treaty with Great Britain for 
the suppression of the slave-trade. A domestic slave-trade was kept up nntil the beginning of the Civil War, in 1861. It was Virginia's 
largest source of revenue. 

2. This is a writ for delivering a person from false imprisonment, or for removing a person from one court to another. The act of suf 
pending the privilege of the writ must be done by the Executive, in the cases specified, under the authority of an Act of Congress. 

3. A deprivation of power to inherit or transmit property, a lose of civil rights, 4c. 

4. Declaring an act criminal or penal, which was innocent when committed. 
6. This was to secure uniformity in taxes laid on persons or on lands. 

6. To secure free trade between the States, that one might not have an advantage over another, was the object of these two clauMi. 

7. This gives to Congress the control of the money belonging to the Republic, and places it beyond the reach of the Executive. 

8. This was to secure equality of rights and privileges among the citizens, and to check the bad effects of foreign influences in the form of 
aristocratic distinctions. 

». By this section the people of the several States who, in conventions, ratified the National Constitution, invested the General Govern- 
ment with the supreme attributes of sovereignty exclusively, while reserving to themselves, or their respective commonwealths, the power* 
peculiar to the municipal authority of a State, which are essential to the regulation of iU internal affairs, and the preservation of it«dome«ti« 
institutions from interference by another State, or by the National Government in a time of domestic tranquillity. The National Governmenl 
is hereby empowered to act for the people of the whole R«public ae a nation. Having no superior, it is sovereign. See Story's Oi>mm«iU«ri«« 
»n tht CtnMitvti<m, chapter iixv. 



i 



THE NATIONAL CONSTITUTION. xiii 

four Years,' and together with the Tice President, chosen for the same Term, be elected, as 
follows : 

Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of 
Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to 
which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Repre- presidential electors. 
sentative, or Person holding an OflBce of Trust or Profit under the United 
States, shall be appointed an Elector. 

[The electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by ballot for two persons, ot 
whom one at least shall not be an inhabitant of the same State with them- 
selves. And they shall make a list of all the persons voted for, and of the ^'■««*'^«!\< (^^^ T^«c«- 

„ ~ , ,.,,., , ,r . President, how 

number of votes for each; which list they shall sign and certify, and trans- elected. 

mit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to 

the President of the Senate. The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate 
and House of Representatives, open all the certificates, and the votes shall then be counted. The- 
person having the greatest number of votes shall be the President, if such number be a majority 
of the whole number of electors appointed; and if there be more than one who have such 
majority, and have an equal number of votes, then the House of Representatives shall immedi- 
ately chuse by ballot one of them for President ; and if no person have a majority, then from 
the five highest on the list the said House shall in like manner chuse the President. But in 
chusing the President, the votes shall be taken by States — the representation from each State 
having one vote ; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two 
thirds of the States, and a majority of all the States shall be necessary to a choice. In every 
case, after the choice of the President, the person having the greatest number of votes of the 
electors shall be the Vice-President. But if there should remain two or more who have equal 
votes, the Senate shall choose from them by ballot the Vice President.^] 

The Congress may determine the Time of chusing the Electors, and the Time of choosing 
Day on which they shall give their Votes; which Day shall be the same eetots. 

throughout the United States." 

No Person except a natural born Citiaen, or a Citizen of the United States at the tim^of the 
Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; 
neither shall any person be eligible to that Office who shall not have at- QuaUficafions of the 
tained to the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident Prestdent. 

within the United States. 

In Case of the Removal of the President from Office, or of his Death, Resignation, or 
Inability to discharge the Powers and Duties of the said office, the same 
shall devolve on the Vice President* and the Congress may by Law provide jteaort in case of hi» 
for the Case of Removal, Death, Resignation or Inability, both of the Presi- disaUUty. 

dent and Vice President, declaring what Officer shall then act as President, 
and such ofiBicer shall act accordingly, until the Disability be removed, or a President shall be- 
elected.' 

The President shall, at stated Times, receive for his Services, a Compen- 
sation, which shall neither be increased nor diminished during the Period for Salary of the Presi- 
which he shall have been elected, and he shall not receive within that '^*"'- 

Period any other Emolument from the United States, or any of them.° 

Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shaU take the follow- Oath of Qffic«. 
ing Oath or AfiBrmation : 

1 The Executive is a co-ordinate but not coequal branch of the Government with the legislative, for he is the agent provided in the Con- 
■titution for executing the laws of a superior, the Congress or legislature. 

2. This clause was afterward annulled, and Article XII. of the Amendments to this Constitution was substituted for it Originally th. 
.lectors voted by ballot, for two persons, one of whom, at leas!, should not be an inhabitant of the same State with themselves. The one who- 
received the highest number of votes was declared to be President, and the one receiving the next highest number was declared to be Vice- 
President, For an example, see page 383. 

3. See Amendments to the Constitution, Article XII. By an Act passed in 1845 (January 23), the electors must be chosen, in each State, on 
the Tuesday next after the first Monday in the month of November of the year in which they are to be elected. In the preceding portion ol 
this history, when the election of a President is spolsen of, it is meant that electors favorable to such candidates were chosen at that time. 

4. For examples, see piiges 476, 501, and Til. 

6. Provision has been made for the President of the Senate, for the time being, or if there shall be no such officer, the Speaker of the Hon.* 
»f Representatives, shall perform the executive functions. 

6. The salary n.f the President was fixed by the first Congress at »25,000 a year, and that of the Vice-President at $8,000, and such they »» 
•t present. The salary for each entire term was so fixed, that the executive might be independent of the legislative department (or it 



xiv SUPPLEMENT. 

" I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of tha 
United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution 
©f the United States." 

Section 2. The President shall be Commander in chief of the Army and 

DutiesofthePresi- Navy of the United States, and of the Mihtia of the several States, when 

de7it. called into the actual Service of the United States;* he may require the 

Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Depart- 

rients, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have 

Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of 

Impeachment.' 

He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, 
provided two thirds of the Senators present concur ; and he shall nominate, 
ITis power to make ^^^ ^J ^^^ ^'^^^'^ the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Am- 
treaites, appoint em- bassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, 
a»m s,ju ff ,e . ^^^ ^^^ other Officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein 
hitherto provided for, and which shall bo established by Law :' but the Con- 
gress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the 
President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments. 

The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen 
May fill vacancies, (jm-j^g tjie Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall ex- 
pire at the End of their next Session.* 
Section 3. He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the 
Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall 
Power to cowcene judge necessary and expedient;* he may, on extraordinary Occasions, con- 
Vongress. ygne both Houses, or either of them," and in Case of Disagreement between 

them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to 
such Time as he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers;' 
he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the officers of 
the Ufiited otates. 

Section 4. The President, Vice President, and all civil Officers of the 
How officers may be United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Con- 
viction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes or Misdemeanors. 



ARTICLE III. 

Section 1. The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, 
and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and 
establish. • The Judges both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold 
Judicial p^cmer, how ^^^^^ q^^^^ ^j^^^j^^ ^^^^ Behaviour, and shall, at stated Times, receive for 
their Services, a Compensation, which shall not be diminished during their 
Continuance in Office.* 

1. This was to insure unity «nd efficiency in action, when foreign war or domestic insurrection should call for the services of the army and 
navy. His large powers as Executive are directed by constitutional provisions. He is the arm of the nation to execute its bidding. 

2. It is presumed that the Executive is above the personal, local, or sectional influences that might be brought to bear, in these cases, on 
the courts or on legislative bodies. The Executive, according to a decision of the Supreme Court, has power to grant a pardon before trial or 
conviction. See Brightley's Analytical Digest of the Laws of the United States, page 7, note (e). 

3. The President is presumed to be more fully informed concerning the foreign relations of the Republic, and the fitness of men for tha 
highest offices. The Senate represents the legislative department of the Government in treaty-making and the appointment of high offlctri, 
«nd is a cht-ck on the Executive against any encroachments on the rights of Congress in the matter. 

4. This limitation to executive appointments is to prevent the President from neutralizing the action of the Senate as a co-ordinat« power. 

5. It is the practice of the President to submit to Congress, at the opening of each session, a statement of national affairs. This is called 
bis Annual Message. Washington and John Adams read their messages in person to the assembled Congress. Jefferson first sent his messag* 
to them, by his private secretary. That practice is still kept up. 

6. The President, with his better information concerning national affairs, can best judge when an extraordinary session of Congress may be 
necessary. 

7. He may also refuse to receive them, and thereby annul or prevent diplomatic relations between the United States and any country. 

8. See page 368, and note I, page 369. This section provides that the Supreme Court shall be a co-ordinate branch of the National Gov- 
ernment, yet independent of and distinct from both the legislative and executive departments. The powers of the National Government, il 
will be seen, are threefold, namely, /epf3^it>f,yu(ficza^, and executive. The first enacts laws, the second interprets them, and tha third 
•olbrcaa them. The Supreme Court consists of one chief-justice and several associate justices, who bold an annual tauion at tba natianal 
aapltal, commencing on the day when Congress meets— firstiWednesday in December. 



THE NATIONAL CONSTITUTION. XV 

Section 2. The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under 
this Constitution, the Laws of tlie United States, and Treaties made, or which 
sliall be made, under their Authority; — to all cases affecting Ambassadors, To what oases it 
other public Ministers and Consuls; — to all Cases of admiralty and marl- extends. 

time Jurisdiction ; — to Controversies to which the United States shall be a 
Party ; — to Controversies between two or more States ; — between a State and Citizens of another 
State; — between Citizens of different States;' — between Citizens of the same State claiming 
Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign 
States, Citizens or Subjects. 

In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a 
State shall be a Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In 
all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appel- jurisdiction of tht 
late Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under Supreme Court. 
such Regulations as the Congress shall make. 

The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment, shall be by 
Jury ; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall 
have been committed ; but when not committed within any State, the Trial Rules respeotino 
shall be at such Place or Places as the Congress may by Law have trials. 

directed.' 

Section 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levy- 
ing "War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Treason defined. 
Comfort.^ 

No Person shall be convicted of Treason, unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the 
same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court. 

The Congress shall have Power to declai'e the Punishment of Treason, 
but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture Sow punished. 
except during the Life of the Person attainted.'' 



ARTICLE IV. 

Section 1. Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and 
judicial Proceedings of every other State.* And the Congress may by general 
Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings ^^'^^defin^!'^^ 
shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.* 

Section 2. The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges Privileges of citi^ns. 
aud Immunities of Citizens in the several States.' 

A person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other Crime, who 
shall flee from Justice, and be found in another State, shall on Demand of Executive requisition. 
the executive authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up, to 
be removed to the State having Jurisdiction of the Crime.' 

1. A citizen of the District of Columbia (note 1, page 383) is not a citizen of a State, within the meaning of this Constitution. The Di»- 
trict is under the immediate control of Congress, and hna neither a legislature or governor. 

2. See Amendments to the Constitution, Articles V., VI., VII., VIII. 

3. At the trial of Aaron Burr (see page 3911), Chief-Justice Marshall said: "Any combination to subvert by force the Government of the 
United States ; violenUy to dismember the Union ; to compel a change in the adminisiration, to coerce the repeal or adoption of a general 
law, is o conspiracy to levy war. And if conspiracy be carried into effect by the actual employment of force, by the embodying and 
assembling of men for the purpose of executing the treasonable design which was previously conceived, it amounts to levying war." 

4. The limit as to forfeiture applies only to the real estate of the criminal, which, at his death, must be restored to his heirs or assigns 
The dower right of his wife also remains untouched. See Kent's Commentarie) on American Lau>,i\. m. This is more humane than the 
English law of treason. It does not punish the innocent wife and children of a criminal on account of his crimes. 

5. A judgment of a State court has the same credit, validity, and effect, in every other court within the United States, which it had In the 
court where it was rendered ; and whatever pleas would be good to a suit thereon in such State, and none others, can be pleaded in any other 
•ourt.within the United States.— ffam/Xon v. ifcConnell, 3 Wheaton, 234. 

€. On the 26th of May, 1790, Congress, by act, gave effect to this section. 

1. This is a recognition of nationality— the supreme rights of the people as citizens of the United States. It decrees the right to all funda- 
mental privileges and immunities wliich any State grants to its citizens, eicepting those granted to corporations, or conferred by ipvclsl 
local -legislation. It Is intended to secure and perpetuate a friendly intercourse throughout the Republic. It aeta aside the erroneooa u- 
tumptlon that National citizenship is subordinate to State citizenship. 

8. This la to aid the claims of justice, by preventing one portion of the Republic becoming an asylum for the criminals of uoth« 



3jyj SUPPLEMENT. 

No Person held to Service or Labour in one State, under the Laws thereof escaping to another, 
shall, in Consequence of any Law or Regulation therein, be discharged from 
Laic regulating^service ^^^^ Service or Labour, but shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to 
whom such Service or Labour may be due.' 

Section 3. New States may be admitted by the Congress into this 

New States, hmo Union ;^ but no new State shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction 

formed and admitted, of ^ny other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more 

States, or Parts of States, without the consent of the Legislatures of the 

States concerned as well as of the Congress.^ 

The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules 
Fmcer of Congress and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the 
over public lands. United States ; and nothing in this Constitution shall be so construed as to 
Prejudice any Claims of the United States, or of any particular State.'' 

Section 4. The Constitution shall guaranty to every State in this Union 
Republican govern- ^ Republican Form of Government,* and shall protect each of them against 
ment guarantied. Invasion ; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when 
the Legislature can not be convened) against domestic violence.* 

ARTICLE V. 

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose 
Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures 
Constitution, how to be of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing 
amended. Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Pur- 

poses, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three 
fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other 
Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress ;' Provided that no Amendment which may 
be made prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the 
first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article ; * and that no State, without its 
Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.' 

ARTICLE VI. 

AJl Debts contracted and Engagements entered into, before the Adoption 
Validity of Debts ^f this Constitution, shall be as valid against the United States under this 
recognized. Constitution, as under the Confederation.'" 

1. This is the clsuse of the Constitution, on which was based the provisions of the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. See page 501. It applied 
to runaway slaves and apprentices. Congress gave effect to it by an act on the lith of February, 1793, and another on the 18th cf September, 
1850. At the time when the Constitution was framed, slavery existed in all the States of the Union, excepting Massachoaeita. By the 
operation of the Thirteenth Amendment of the Constitution (which see on page 156) this clause has no relation to any other persons excepting 
fugitive indentured apprentices. 

■i. The Congress is not compelled to admit a new State. It is left to the option of that body, whether any new State shall be admitted 

3. States have been admitted in three ways : 1. By joint action of the Congress and a State, by which a portion of a Slat* has been mad* 
a separate commonwealth, as in the case of Vermont, Kentucky, Maine, and Virginia, 8. By an act of Congress, creating a State directly 
from a Territory of the United States, as in the case of Tennessee. 3. By a joint resolution of Congress and a foreign State, tuch State may b» 
aduiitted, as in the case of Texas. 

4. This provides for the establishment, under the authority of Congress, of Territorial governments, which is the first step toward the for- 
mation of a State or States. The first government of the kind was that of the .'Jorthwestern Territory (see page 36S), established in 1787, 
and adopted by Congress under the National Constitution of the 7th of August, 1 789. 

5. No other form of government could exist witlin the United SUites, without peril to the Republic. By this section, the Nation»> 
Government is empowered to assume positive sovereignty as to the fundamental character of the State Government, leaving to the State terri- 
torial sovereignty, as to its municipal laws and domestic institutions, so long as they are consonant with a republican form of government 

6. The States are prohibited from keeping troops as a standing army, or ships of war, in time of peace, individually ; therefore it is mad* 
the duty of the sovereign power of the United States to protect the States against invasion and *' domestic violence," such as treason, rebel- 
lion, or Insurrection. When these exist in any State, it is the duty of the Nauonal Government to use its power in suppressing it. 

7. This ariic-'e effectually checks any fundamental change in the Constitution, excepting in a way which recognizes the source of aU tru* 
sovereignty, the People, unless it be by sudden and violent revolution. 

8. See section 9, page '47. The adoption of the Thirteenth Amendment of the Constitution (see page 756) renders this section a dead 
letter. 

9. Here, again, is a provision for securing the smaller States from encroachments on their rights by the larger States. 

10. This was for the security to the creditors of the United States, of the payment of debts incurred during the KcTolution. It was t- 
national and positive recogui'.ion of the postulate in iQternational law, that " Debts due to foreigners, and obligatioDji to other creditors, siu*- 
Tiv* a change in the Government. " 



THE XATIOXAL C OXST I T UTI OiT. j^{\ 

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States wliich shall be made in Pursuance 
tliereof ; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority 
of the United States, &-hall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges Supreme law of the 
iu every State shall be bound thereby, any thing in the Constitution or Laws ^"<^ dejlned. 
of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.' 

The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several Stat» 
Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States 
and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support oaVi, o/whom requir- 
tliis Constitution ; ^ but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualifi- «<^. a«^ -wluxtpr. 
cation to any Office or public Trust under tlie United States. ^ 



ARTICLE YII. 



The Ratification of the Conventions of nine States shall be sufficient for 
the Establisliment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the 

Same.* 



Ratiflcation. 



Done in Convention by the Unanimous Consent of the States present, the Seventeenth Day of 
September, in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty-seven, and of 
the Independence of the United States the Twelfth. In "Witness whereof We have hereunto 
subscribed our Names. 

Geo. Washington, 
President, and deputy from Virginia. 



NEW HAMPSHIRE. 
John Langdon, 
Nicholas Gilman. 

MASSACHUSETTS. 
Nathaniel Gorham, 
RuFus King. 

CONNECTICUT. 
William Samuel Johnson, 
Roger Sherman. 

NEW YORK. 
Alexander Hamilton. 

NEW JERSEY. 

Y'lLLiAM Livingston, 
David Brearley, 
William Paterson, 
Jonathan Dayton. 



PENNSYLVANIA. 

Benjamin Franklin, 
Thomas Mifflin, 
Robert Morris, 
George Clymer, 
Thomas Fitzsimons, 
Jared Ingersoll, 
James Wilson, 
Gouverneur Morris. 

DELAWARE. 
George Reed, 
Gunning Bedford, jr., 
John Dickinson, 
Richard Bassett, 
Jacob Broom. 

MARYLAND. 

James M' Henry, 

Daniel op St. Thos. Jensfer, 

Daniel Carroll. 

Attest : 



VIRGINIA. 
John Blair, 
James Madison, jr. 

NORTH CAROLINA. 

William Blount, 
Richard Dobbs Spaight, 
Hugh Williamson. 

SOUTH CAROLINA. 
Charles C. Pinckney, 
Charles Pinckney, 
John Rutledge, 
Pierce Butler. 

GEORGIA. 

William Few, 
Abraham Baldwin. 



WiLLLiM Jackson, Secretary. 



1. a clear and positive declaration of the supremacy of the National Government, I 

2. State officers are bound to support the Constitution because they may be required to perform some lervice li 
■supreme law of the land," in other words, of the Republic 

3. This is to prevent a political union of Church and State, which isalway prejudicutl to th« be»t iuterwtt of botk. 
4 See note 1, pnge 360. 



giving <ff*ct t* that 



SUPPLEMENT. 



AMENDMENTS' 

TO THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES, RATIFIED ACCORDING TO THE 
PROVISIONS OF THE FIFTH ARTICLE OF THE FOREGOING CONSTITUTION. 

ARTICLE I. 

Congress shaU make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or 
Freedom in religion prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or 
and speech, and of the '^ . .. ^u ■ u^ c ^u i u. * ui Im- 

press. 01 the press ; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to peti- 

tion the Government for a redress of grievances.' 

ARTICLE II. 

A well-regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, 
the right of the people to keep and bear Arras, shall not be infringed. 

ARTICLE III. 

No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the 
Soldiers. consent of the Owner, nor in a time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed 

by law.' 

ARTICLE IV. 

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects, against 
unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants 

Search-warrants, shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or afifirmation, and 
particularly describing the place to be searched, and the person or things to 
be seized.* 



1. At the first session of the First Congress, begun and held in the city of New York, on Wednesday, the 4th of March, 1789, many 
amendmenU to the National Constitution were offered for consideration. The Congress proposed ten of them to the legislatures of the seve- 
ral States. These were ratified by the constitutional number of State Legislatures in the middle of December, 1791. Another was proposed, 
on the 6th of March, 1194, and was ratified in 1798; and still another on the 12th of December, 1803, which was ratified in 1S04. These, 
with the other ten, became a part of the National Const tutien. A thirteenth amendment was proposed by Congress on the Ist of May, 1810, 
but has ilSver been ratified. It was to pohibit citizens of the United States accepting, claiming, receiving, or retaining any title of nobility 
or honor, or any present, pension, office, or emolument of any kind whatever, from any "person, king, prince, or f'>reign Power," without 
the consent of Congress, under the penalty of disfranchisement, or ceasing to be a citizen of the United Siates. 

The Thirteenth Amendment was adopted by Congress on the Slst of January, 1865, and its ratification by the requisite number of State 
Legislatures was announced on the 18th of December following. A Fourteenth Amendment was proposed by a joint resolution adopted on 
the 13th of June, 1866, the object of which was to complete the work done by the Thirleenth Ameadment, by guaranteeing to a// citizen* 
an equality of civil and political rights, and the payment of the public debt, also to forbid the payment, by the general or any State govern- 
ment, of any debt or obligation incurred in aid of the rebellion, or any claim fbr the loss or emancipation of any slave. This amendment 
was ratified by twenty-two States (five less than the required number), when this record closed, in May, 1868. 

The Amendments to the Constitution, excepting the Twelfth, are auihoritative declarations securing to the people and the several States 
certain rights, against any possible encroachments of Congress. They form a Bill of Rights. 

ii. This article gives an additional assurance of religious freedom. See clause 3d, Article VL, of the Constitution. It also secures the 
invaluable right of the freedom of speech and of the press ; and the privilege for the people of making their grievances known to the 
National Government. 

S. This is to protect citizens, in time of peace, from the oppressions of military power, and to secure uniformity in the rules for quartering 
soldiers upon citizens in time of war. 

4. The security of the private citizen from an infringement of hia rights by public officers, herein guaranteed, is in accordance with th» 
English mazim that " Every man's house is his castle." See page 21i 



THE NATIONAL CONSTITUTION. 
ARTICLE V. 

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a pre- 
sentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land 
or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or 
public danger ; ' nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be ^"^^'''^ crimes. 
twice put in jeopardy of life or limb ; nor shall be compelled in any Criminal 
Case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due 
process of law; nor shaU private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.* 

ARTICLE VI. 

In aU criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and pubUc trial, by 
an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been 
committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, 
and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation ; to be con- ^''^"^ ^^ '^^^' 
fronted with the witnesses against him; to have Compulsory process for 
obtaining "Witnesses in his favour, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence. 

ARTICLE VII. 

In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right 
of trial by jury sliaU be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be other- 
wise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the '^^'* "* common law. 
rules of the common law. 

ARTICLE VIII. 

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor „ ., 

cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.^ 

ARTICLE IX. 

The enumeration, in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be con- ^ , . • t.4 a -g ^ 
' , , , , . Certain righU defintd. 

etrued to deny or disparage others retained by the people. 

ARTICLE X. 

The powers not delegated to the United States, by the Constitution, nor 
prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to ^^°^^ reatrved. 
the people.* 

ARTICLE XI. 

The judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend 
to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the judicial powtr 
United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of limited. 

any foreign State."' 

I. In «acb cases offenses are within the jurisdiction of the military and naval courts-martial. 

S. These prohibitions do not relate to State governments, but to the National Government, according to a deci.ion of the Suprem. Coor» 
the several States make their own laws on these subjects. 

3. These several amendments, concerning the operations of law through the instrumentality of the court., are all InUnded to lecBr. tb« 
titixen against the arbitrary exercise of power on the pat of the judiciarj'. 

4. That is to say, because certain righU and powers of the people are not enumerated in the Constitution, It !• not to be Inferred that th.y 

5. This' is simply an enunciation of the broad democratic principle, that the people are the true sources of all political power. 

6. This is to limit the judicial power of ihe National courts Previous t-> the adoption of this amendment, the Supreme Court had d.cld.4 
that the power of the National judiciary extended to suits brought by or against a State of the Republic Now, no person has a nght to tern. 
mence a personal suit against a State, in the Supreme Court of the United States, for the recovery of property seiied and sold by a Stat* 



^^ SUrPLEMENT. 

ARTICLE XII. 

The Electors shall meet in ihcir respective States, and vote bv baHo* P^r P'-esid^nt and Yico 
President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inbabitPit of the same State 
ing '"the "electian^^/ with themselves ; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as 
rresident and Vice President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as "Vice President, and 
they shall make distmct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all 
persons voted for as Yice President, and of the number of votes ior each, ■which lists they 
shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the n-ovornmciit of the United States, 
directed to The President of the Senate; — The President of the Senate shall, in the presence 
of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shalj 
then be counted ; — the person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the 
President, if such number be a majority of the vs'hole number of electors appointed; and if no 
person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers, not exceeding 
three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose imme- 
diately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by 
states, the representation from each state having one vote ; a quorum for this purpose shall con- 
sist of a member or members from two thirds of the States, and a majority of all the states shall 
be necessary to a choice. And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President 
whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next fol- 
lowing, then the Yice President shall act as President, as in the case of the deatli or other con- 
stitutional disability of the President. The person having the greatest number of votes as Yice 
President shall be the Yice President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of 
Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the 
list, the Senate shall choose the Yice President ; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two 
thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary 
to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible 
to that of Yice President of the United States. 

ARTICLE XIII. 

Section i. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, whereof the party 
c<;™„.«,. f^h:^,i^„ shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or la any placo 
Slavery forbidden, subject to their jurisdiction. 

Section 8. Congress shall have power to enforce this Article by appropriate legislatioa. 

ARTICLE XIV. I 
Section 1. All persons bom or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdic- 
tion thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein 
Cifizenshtj). ^-^^^ reside. No State shall make or enforce any lav,- which shall abridge 
the privileges or inununities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any 
person of life, liberty, or property %vithout due process of law; nor deny to any person within 
its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. 

Section 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their 

respective numbers, coimtmg the whole number of pei-sons in each State, 

Apportionment reg- excluding Indians not taxed; but when the right to vote at any election 

"f^^^'^Use ^''^ ^ '^ ^*^^' ^^^ choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United 

States, Representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of 

ft State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of 

such State, (being twenty-one years of age and citizens of the United States,) or in any way 

abridged except for participation in rebellion or other crime, the basis of representation 

therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear 

to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State. 

1 The Joint Resolution of Colsibss, proposing this amendment, was passed on the 13th of Juns. 1866; 
and on the 30th of July, 1868, the k^ec-etary of State proclaimed that the required number of States had 
ratified it, to make it a part of the Natioaa. Constitution. 



THE NATIONAL CONSTITUTION. ^^-^ 

Section 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Conjp-cEs, or Elector, or Pres:- 
DisabUities ^®^*' °^ Vice-President, or hold any ofHce, civil or mihtary, under the 

United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath 
as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State 
legislatm-e, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of 
the United States, shall have engaged m insurrection or rebellion against the sam?, or given 
aid or comfort to the enemies thereof; but Congress may, by a vote of two-thirds of each 
House, remove such disabUity. 

Section 4. The vaHdity of the pubUc debt of the United States, authorized by law, includ- 
ing debts incuiTed for payment of pensions and bounties, for services ui 
Inviolability of the suppressmg msmTCction or rebeUion, shaU not be questioned; but neither 
national faith. the United States nor any State shall assums or pay any debt or obliga- 
tion incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, 
or any claim for the loss of or emancipation of any slave. But all such debts, obUgatious, and 
claims shall be held illegal and void. 

Section 5. Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the iJro\Tsious 
of the Article. 

ARTICLE XV. 

Section 1. The right of the citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or 
abridged by the United States or any State, on account of race, color, or 
Eight to rote. previous condition of servitude. 
SaciiON 2. The Confiress shall have power to enforce this Article by appropriate leftislation. 



m 



THE NATIONAL PROGRESS. 



Here, at the bspnning of the second century of the life of our Republic, let us take » 
brief review of the Material and Intellectual progress of our country during the first hundred 
years of its political independence. 

The extent of the conceded domain of the United States, in 17T6, was not more than half a 
million square miles ; now ^ it is mor^s than three million three hundred thousand square miles. 
Its population then was about a million and a half ; now it is forty million. 

The products of the sod are the foundations of the material wealth of a nation. It has been 
eminently so with tis, notwithstanding the science of agriculture and the construction of good 
implements of labor were greatly neglected mxtil the early part of the present century. 

A hundred years ago the Agricultural interests of our coimtry were mostly in the hands of 
imeducated men. Science was not applied to husbandry. A spirit of improvement was 
scarcely kno\vn. The son copied the ways oZ his father. He worked with no other implements 
and pursued no other methods of cultivation ; and he who attempted a change was regarded 
as a visionary or an innovator. Very little associated effort for improvement in the business 
of fanning was then seen. The first association for such a purpose was formed in the South, 
and was kno%vn as the " South Carolina Agricultural Society," organized in 1784 A similar 
society was formed in Pennsylvania the following year. Now there are State, county, and 
even town ag* icxilturai societies, in ahnost every part of the Union. 

Agricultural implements were rude and simple. They consisted chiefly of the plough,, 
harrow, spade, hoe, hand-ralie, scythe, sickle, and wooden fork. The plough had a clumsy 
wrought-ii'on share with wooden mould-board, which was somstimes plated with pieces of old 
tin or sheet-iron. The rest of the structure was equally clumsy ; and the implement required, 
in its use, twice the amoimt of strength, of moii and beast, that the preasnt plough does. Im- 
provements in the construction of ploughs during the past fifty years, save to the country an- 
nually, in work and teams, at least $13,000,000. The first patent for a cast-iron plough was 
issued in 1797. To the beginning of 1875, about 400 patents have been granted. 

A himdred years ago the seed was sown by hand, and tho entire crop was harvested by 
hard manual labor. The grass was cut with a scythe, and " cui-ed " and gathered with a fork 
and hand-rake. The gi-ain was cut with a siclde, threshed vd'ih. a flail or the treading of horses, 
and was cleared of the chaff by a large clamshell-shaped fan of wicker-work, used in a gentle 
breeze. The drills, seed-sowers, cultivatoi-s, mowers, reapers, thi-eshing-machines, and f amiing- 
rnills of our day, were aU unknown. Thoy are the inventions of a time within the memory of 
Hving men. Abortive attempts were made toward the close of the last century to introduce 
a threshing-machine from England, but the flail held sway untd two generations ago. -i 

Indian com, tobacco, wheat, rye, oats, potatoes, and hay were staple products of the farm 
a hundred years ago. Timothy and orchard grass had then just been introduced. The cultiva- 
tion of all these has been greatly increased. Then nearly the whole products, excepting tobacco, 
were consumed by the million and a haK people ; now forty million are supported by them 

'vNTien the word rwio appears in this relation, it means the year 1875. 

^ Washington, in a letter to General Htnry Lee, wnttt n in tue autumn of 1793, remarks : " The model 
[of a threshing machine] brought ovt-r by the English farmiT-, may also be a good one, but the utility of 
it among carders negroes and ignfrant overseers wi 1 depend absolutely upon the simplicity of construc- 
tion : for if there is anything complex in the machinery, it wi 1 be no longer in use than a mushroom is in 
existence. I have seen eo much of the beginning and ending of ntw inventions, that I have almost 
resolved to go on in the old way of treading uatil 1 get settled again at home, and can attend myself to 
the management of one." 



THE NATIONAL PROGRESS. XXV 

and vast amounts of agricultural products are exported to foreign countries. At the present 
time these products amount annually, on an average, in round numbers as foUows • Indian 
com, 900,000,000 bushels; wheat, 270,000,000; rye, 22,000,000 ; oats, 300,000,000 ^ potatoes. 
165,000,000 ; and buckwheat (introduced within tho century), 15,000,000. The hay crop 
averages about 28,000,000 tons; the tobacco crop about 26.5,000,000 pounds; flax, 28,000,000 
pounds, and hemp, 12,000 tons. To these agricultural products have been added within the 
century, barley, cotton, and sugar. Of barley the average crop is about 28,000,000 bushels; 
cotton about 2,000,000,000 poimds, and sugar 120,000 hogsheads of 1,000 pounds each. The 
expansion of the cotton culture has been marveUous. In 1784, eight hales of cotton sent to 
England from Charleston, were seized by the custom-houso authorities in Liverpool on the 
ground that so large a quantity could not have come from the United States. The progress of 
its culture was slow until the invention of the gin, by Mr. Whitney, for clearing the seed from 
the fibre. It did the v.-ork of many persons. The cultivation of cotton rapidly spread. From 
1792 to 1800 the amount of cotton raised had increased from 133,000 pounds to 18,000,000 
poimds, all of which was wanted in England, where improved machinery was manufacturing 
it into cloth. The value of slave labor was increased, and a then dying institution hved in vigor 
until killed by the Civil War. The value of the cotton crop in 1792 was $30,000 ; now its average 
annual value is about $180,000,000. 

FiTiit cultm-e a hundred years ago wa:; very httle thought of. Inferior varieties of apples, 
pears, peaches, plums, and chei-ries were cultivated for family use. It was not until the begin- 
nirg of the present century that any large orchards were planted. The cultivation of grapes 
and berries was almost wholly imknown fifty years ago. The first horticultm-al society was 
formed in 1829. Before that time fruit was not an item of commercial statistics in our country. 
Now the average annual value of fruit is estimated at 880,000,000. Our grape crop alone 
exceeds in value $30,000,000. 

Improvements in Live stock have all been made within the present centm-y. The native 
breeds were descended from stock sent over to the colonies, and were generally inferior. In 
1772 Washington wrote in his diary : "With one hundi-ed mUch cows on my farm, I have to ' 
buy butter for my family." Now 11,000,000 cows supply 40,000,000 inhabitants with milk, 
butter, and cheese, and allow large exports of the latter article. At least 225,000,000 gallons 
of milk are sold annually. The annual butter product of om- country now is more than 
500,000,000 poimds, and of cheese 70,000,000. There are now about 30,003,000 homed cattle in 
the United States, equal in average quality to those of any countiy in the world. 

A himdred years ago mules and asses were chiefly used for farming purposes and ordinary 
transportation. Carriage-horses were imported from Eiu-ope. Now our horses of every kind 
are equal to those of any other country. It is estimated that there are about 10,000,000 horses 
in the United States, or one to e7ery four persons. 

Sheep husbandry has greatly improved. The inferior breeds of the last century, raised 
only in suflacient quantity to supply the table, and the domestic looms in the manufactm-e of 
yams and coarse cloth, have been superseded by some of the finer varieties. Merino sheep 
were introduced eai-ly in this centm-y. The embargo before the war of 1812, and the establish- 
ment of manufactures here afterward, stimulated sheep and wool-raising, and these have been 
important items in our national wealth. There are now about 30,000,000 sheep in the United 
States, California is taking the lead as a wool-producing State. In 1870, the wool product of 
the United States amounted to 100,000,000 poimds. 

Improvements in the breed of swine during the last fifty years have been very great. 
They have become a large item in our national commercial statistics. At this time there ar» 
about 26,000,000 head of swine in this country. Enormous quantities of pork, packed and 
in the form of bacon, are exported annually. 

These brief statistics of the principal products of agriculture, show its development in this 
countiy, and its importance. Daniel Webster said, " Agricultiu-e feeds ; to a great extent it 
clothes us ; without it we should not have manufactures ; we should not have commerce. 
They aU stand together like pillars in a cluster, the largest in the centre, and that largest— 
Agrichltxjke. " 

The great manufacturing interests of our country are tho product of the century now 
closing. The poHcy of the British government was to suppress manufacturing in tho Eaglish- 
American colonies, and cloth-making was confined to the household. When non-importation 
agreements cut off suppUes from Great Britain, the Irish flax-wheel and the Dutch wool-whea 



:\:iyi 



supple:.ie:tt. 



were made active in families. All other Iijids of manufacturing were of small accoimt in tlui 
comitry until the concluding decade of the last centiu-y. la Great Britain the inventions of 
Hargreaves, Arlvwright, and CromptoUj had stimulated the cotton and wooUen manufactures, 
and tlic effects finally reached the United States. Massachusetts offered a gi-ant of money to 
promote the establishment of a cotton-mill, and one was built at Beverly in 1787, the firs< 
erected in the United States. It had not the improved English machinery. In 1789 Samue. 
Slater came from England with fuU knowledge of that machinery, and in connection witli 
Messrs. Ahny and Brown, of Providence, Pv,. I., established a cotton factory there in 1790, wich 
the improved implements. Then was really begun the manufactm-e of cotton in the United 
States. Twenty years later the number of cotton mills in our country was 168, with 90,00(i 
spindles. The business has greatly expanded. In Massachusetts, the foremost State in the 
manufacture ol cotton, there are now over 200 mUls, employing, in prosperous times, 50,000 
ipersons, and a capital of more than $30,000,000. The city of LoweU was founded by the erec- 
tion of a cotton mill there in 1823; and there the printing of calico was first begun in the United 
- States soon afterward. 

With wool as with cotton, the manufacture into cloth was confined to households, for home 
jise, imtil near the close of the la^st century. The wool was carded between two cards held ia 
the hands of the operator, and aU the processes were slow and crude. In 1797, Asa Whitte- 
more, of Massachusetts, invented a carding-machine, and this led to the establishment of 
-sTooUen manufactures outside of families. In his famous report on manufactures, in 1791, 
Alexander Hamilton said that of woollen goods, hats only had reached maturity. The busi- 
ness had been cai-ried on with success in colonial times. The wool was felted by hand, and 
furs were added by the same slow process. This manual labor continued vmtil a little more 
than thirty years ago, when it was supplanted by machinery. Immense munbers of hats 
of every kind are now made in our country. 

At the time of Hamilton's report there was only one woollen-mill in the Unitea States. It 
was at Hartford, Connecticut. In it were made cloths and cassimeres. Now woollen fac- 
tories may be f oimd in almost every State in the Union, turning out annually the finest cloths, 
cassimeres, flannels, carpets, and every variety of goods made of wool. In this business, as in 
cotton, Massachusetts has taken the lead. The value of manufactured wooUens in the United 
States, at the close of the Civil War, was estimated at about $50,000,000. The supply of wool 
in the United States has never been equal to the demand. 

The smelting of iron ore, and the manufacture of iron, has become an immense business in 
our country. The development of ore deposits, and of coal used in smelting, are among the 
marvels of our history. English navigation laws discoiu-aged iron manufacture in the colonies. 
Only blast-furnaces for making pig-iron were allowed. This product was nearly all sent to 
England in exchange for manufactured articles ; and the whole amoimt of such exportation, 
at the beginning of the old war for independence, was less than 8,000 tons annually. The 
colonists were whoUy dependent upon Great Britain for articles manufactured of iron and 
steel, excepting rude implements made by blacksmiths for domestic use. During the war the 
Continental Congress were compelled to establish manufactures of iron and steel. These were 
chiefly in Northern New Jereey, the Hudson Highlands, and Western Connecticut, where 
excellent ore was found, and forests in abundance for making charcoal. The fijrst use of 
anthracite coal for smelting iron was in the Continental armory at Carlisle, in Pennsylvania, 
in 1775. But charcoal was imiversaUy used imtil 1840 for smelting ores. 

Now iron is manufactured in om* country in eveiy form from a nail to a locomotive. A 
vast number of machines have been invented for carrying on these manuf actm-es ; and the 
products in cutlery, fire-arms, railway materials, and machinery of every kind, employ vast 
numbers of men and a great amovmt of capital. Our locomotive builders are regarded as the 
best in the world ; and no nation on the globe can compete with us in the construction of 
., steam-boats of every kind, from the iron-clad war steamer to the harbor tug. 

In the manufacture of copper, silver, and gold, there has been great progress. At the 
close of the Revolution no manufactures of the kind existed in our country. Now the manu- 
facture of copper ware yearly, of every kind, jewelry and watches, has become a large item 
in om- commercial tables. 

The manufactiu-e of paper is a very large item in the business of our country. At the 
close of the Revolution there were only three mills in the United States. At the begin- 
ning of the war a demand spnmg up, and WiUcox, in his mill near Philadelphia, made 
the first writing-pafier produced in this coimtry. He manufactured the thick, coarso 
paper on which the Continental money was pj:-inted. So early as 1794 the business had so 



THE NATIONAL PROGRESS. XXvij 

increased that there were in Pennsylvania alone forty-eight paper-mills. There has been a 
steady increase in the business ever since. Within the last twenty-five years that increase has 
been enormous, and 3-et not sufficient to meet the demand. Improvements in printing presses 
have cheapened the production of books and newspapers, and the circulation of these has greatly 
increased. It is estimated that the amount of paper now manufactured annually in the UnitedT 
States for these, for paper-hangings, and for wrapping paper, is full 800,000,000 pounds. The- 
supply of raw material here has not been equal to the demand, and rags to the value of about. 
$2,000,000 in a year have been imported. 

The manufactiu-e of ships, carriages, wagons, cIocIjs and watches, pins, leather, glass;. 
Indian rubber, silk, wood, sewing-machines, and a variety of other things wholly unknowia or 
feebly carried on a himdred years ago, now flom-ish and form very important items in our 
domestic conunerce. The sewing-machine is an American invention, and the first really prac- 
tical one was first offered to the public by EUas Howe, Jr., about thirty years ago. A patent 
had been obtained for one five years before. Great improvements have been made, and now 
a very extensive business in the manufacture and sale of sewing-machines is carried on by- 
different companies, employing a large amount of capital and costly machinery, and a great 
number of persons. 

The mining interests of the United States have become an eminent part of the national 
wealth. The extraction of lead, iron, copper, and the precious metals, and coal from the bosom 
of the earth, is a business that has almost wholly grown up within the last hundred yeare. , 
In 1754 a lead mine was worked in Southwestern Virginia; and in 1778, Dubuque, a French: 
miner, worked lead ore deposits on the western bank of the Upper Mississippi. The Jesuit . 
missionaries discovered copper in the Lake Superior region more than two himdred years ago, . 
and that remains the chief source of our native copper ore. That metal is produced in smaller ■ 
quantities in other States, chiefly in the West and Southwest. 

A lust for gold, and the laiowledge of its existence in America, was the chief incentive to 
emigi'ation to these shores. But within the domain of our republic very little of it was found, 
imtil that domain was extended far toward the Pacific ocean. It was unsuspected until long 
after the Revolution. Finally gold was discovered among the mountains of Virginia, North 
and South Carohna, and in Georgia. North Carolina was the first State in the Union to send 
gold to the mint in Philadelphia. Its finst small contribution was in 1804. From that time 
imtil 1833 the average amount produced froifl North Carolina mines did not exceed $2,500 
annually. Virginia's first contribution was in 1829, when that of North Carohna, for that 
year, was $128,000. Georgia sent its first contribution in 1830. It amounted to $212,000. The 
product so increased that branch mints were established in North Carolina and Georgia ia.i, 
1837 and 1838, and another at New Orleans. 

In 1848 gold was discovered on the American fork of the Sacramento river in California; , 
and soon afterward elsewhere in that region. A gold fever seized the people of the United.,' 
States, and thousands rushed to Cahfomia in search of the jjrecious metals. Within a year 
from the discovery, nearly 50,000 people were there. Less than five years after\vard Cahfor- 
nia, in one year, sent to the United States mint full $40,000,000 in gold. Its entire gold pi-o- 
duct to this time is estimated at more than $800,000,000. Over all the far western States and 
Territories the precious metals — gold and silver — seem to be scattered in jirofusion, and the 
amovmt of mineral wealth yet to be discovered there seems to be incalculable. Our coal fields 
seem to be mexhaustible ; and out of the bosom of the earth, in portions of our country, flow 
miUions of barrels annually of petroleixm or rock oil, affording the cheapest illuminating 
material in the world. 

Mineral coal was iirst discovered and used in Pennsylvania at the period of the Revolution. 
"a boat load was sent down the Susquehanna from Wilkes-Barr*? for the use of the Continental 
Iv'orks at Carhsle. But it was not much used before the War of 1812 ; and the regular busi-- 
ness of mining this fuel did not become a part of the commerce of the countrj' before the year - 
1820, when 365 tons were sent to Philadelphia. At the present time the amount of coal sent tc * 
market from the American mines of all kinds is equal to full 15,000,000 tons annually. 

The commerce of the United States has had a wonderful gro^^^;h. Its most active develops 
ment was seen in New England. British legislation imposed heavy burdens upon it tn ColoniaC 
times, and, hke manufactures, it was greatly depressed. The New Englanders built many- 
vessels for their own use, but more for others ; and, just before the breaking out of 1;he Revo- 
lution, there was quite a brisk trade carried on between the EngUsh- American Colonies and 
the West Indies, as well as with the mother country. The Colonists exported tolmco, 1-ambcr, 
shingles, staves, masts, tiupentine, hemp, flax, pot and pearl ashes, sal:cd fijh in c"c t c^-_xi.L 



XXVlll 



SUPPLEMENT. 



ties, some corn, live stock, pig-iron, and skins and furs procured by traflflc with the Indians, 
Whale and cod fishing was an important branch of commerce. In the former, there were 160 
vessels employe*' " +he beginning of 1775, and sperm candles and whale oil were exported to 
Great Britain. In exchange for New England products, a large amoimt of molasses was 
brought from the West Indies and made into rum to sell to the Indians and fishermen, and to 
f rclionge for slaves on the coast of Africa. The entire exports of the Colonies in the year 
1770 amoimted in value to $14,262,000. 

At the close of the war, the British government refused to enter into conunercial relations 
v,'ith tho United States government, beUeving that the weak League of States would soon be 
dissolved ; but when a vigorous national government was formed in 1789, Great Britain, for 
the first, sent a resident minister to our government, and entered into a commercial arrange- 
ment with us. Meanwhile a brisk trade had sprung up between the Colonies and Great 
Britain, as well as ^vith other countries. From 1784 to 1790 the exports from the United States 
to Great Britam amounted to $33,000,000, and the imports from Great Britain to $87,000,000. 
At the same time several new and important branches of industi-y had appeared and floirr- 
ished with great rapidity. 

JYoni that time the expansion of American commerce was marvellous, in spite of the checks 
It received from British jealousy, wars, piracies in the Mediterranean Sea and elsewhere, and 
tho clTects of r-obargoes. The tonnage of American ships, which, in 1789, was 201,.562, was in 
ISTO more than 7,000,000. The exports from the United States in 1870 amounted to about 
6404,000,000, and the imports to about $395,000,000 m gold. 

The domestic commerce of the United States is imm3nse. A vast sea-coast line, great lakes, 
Targe rivers, and many canals, afford scope for interstate commerce and with adjoining coun- 
tries, not equaUed by those of any nation. The canal and railway systems in the United 
States are the product chiefly of the present century. So also is navigation by steam, on 
which river commerce chiefly relies for transportation. This was begim in the year 1307. 
T-19 first canals made in this country W3re two short ones, for a water passage around the 
. South Hadley and Montague Falls, in Massachusetts. These were constructed in 1792. At 
about the same time the Inland Lock Navigation Companies, in the State of New York, began 
their work. The Middlesex Canal, connecting Lowell with Boston harbor, was completed in 
1808„ and the great Erie Canal, 363 miles in length, was finished in 1825, at a cost of almost 
. $8,000,000. Tlie aggregate length of canals buUt iu the United States is 3,200 miles. 

The first railway built in the United States was one three miles in length, that connected 
the granite quarries at Quincy, Massachusetts, with the Neponset River. It was completed ia 
1327; horse-power was used. The first use of a locomotive in this country was in 1829, when 
one was put upon a railway that connected the coal mines of the Delaware and Hudson Canal 
Company with Honesdale. Now railways for m a thick network all over the United States 
east of the Mississippi, and are rapidly spreading over the States and Territories beyond, to the 
Pacific Ocean. To these facihties for commercial operations, must be added the Electro- 
Magnetic Telegraph, an American invention, as a method of transmitting intelligence, and 
-giving warning signals to the shipping and agricultural interests concerning the actual and 
probable state of the weather each day. The first line, forty miles in length, was constructed 
between Baltimore and Washington, in 1844 Now the lines are extended to every part of our 
Union, and aU. over the civilized world, traversing oceans and rivers, and bringing Persia and 
New York within one hour's space of intercommunication. 

Banking institutions and insurance companies are intimately connected with commerce. 
The first bank in the United States was established in 1781, as a financial aid to the govern- 
ment. It was called the Bank of North America. The Bank of New York and Bank of 
Massachusetts were established soon afterward. On the recommendation of Hamilton in 1791, 
a national bank was established at Phfiadelphia, with a capital of $10,000,000, of which sum 
the government subscribed $2,000,000. Varioas banking system?, under State charters, have 
since been tried. During the Civil War a system of national banking was established, by 
which there is a imiform paper currency throughout the Union. The number of national 
banks at the close of 13:33 was Gj; the number at tha close of 1371 was not far from 1,703, uivolv- 
ing capital to the amount of almost $.500,000,000. 

Fire, marine, and life insurance companies have flouriahod greatly in the United States. 
The first incorporated company was estabUshed in 1792, in Philadelphia, and laiown as the 
'' Fire Insiu-ance Company of North America. " Another was established in Providence, Rhoda 
Island, in 1799, and another in New York, in 1SD6. Tho first llio insurance company was char- 
^tereJ ia Massachusetts in 1325, and tho "New York Life Insurance andTrxrst Company" was 



THE NATIONAL PROGRESS. Xxi.K 

BstabKshed in 1829. AU others are of racent organization. A^ a rub, the business of insuran-3 
of every kind is profitable to tho insurers and tha iasurei The amount of capital en^^aged in 
it,is enormous. The fli-o risks alone, at the close of 1S74, amounted to about $200 000 000 

Our growth in population has been steadUv inereased by immigration from Europe It 
began very moderately after the Revolution. From 1784 to 1704 the average number of 
immigrants a year was 4,000. During the last ten years the number of parsons who have 
emigrated to the United States from Europe is estimated at over 2,000,000, who brought witli 
them, in the aggregate, $200,000,000 in money. This capital and tho productive labor of tha 
immigrants, have added much to the wealth of our country. This emigration and wealth is 
less than during the ten years preceding the Civil War, durmg which time there came to this 
country from Europe 2,814,.5o4 persons, bringing with them an average of at least $100 or au 
aggregate of over $281,000,000. ' 

The Arts, Sciences, and Invention have made great progress in our country during the last 
hundred years. These, at the close of the Revolution, were of little account in estimating the 
advance of the race. The practitioners of the Arts of Design, at that period, were chiefly Euro- 
peans. Of native artists, C. W. Peale and J. S. Copley stood at the head of painters. There 
were no sculptors, and no engravers of any eminence. Architects, in the propar sense, there 
were none. After the" Revolution a few good painters appeared, and these have gradually 
increased in numbers and exceUence, without much encouragement, except in portrait- 
ure, until tvithia the last twenty-five years. We have now good sculptors, architects, 
engravers, and Lithographers; and iu aU of these departments, as well as in photography, very 
great progress 3ias been made within the last thirty or forty years. In wood engraving, 
especially, the improvement has been wonderful Forty years ago there were not more than 
a dozen practitioners of the art in this country ; now there are between four and five hundred. 
At the head of that class of artists stands the nama of Dr. Alexander Anderson, who was the 
first man who engraved on wood in the United States. Ha died in 1870 at the age of ninety- 
five years. In bank note engraving we have attained to greater exceUence than any other 
people. It is considered the most perfect branch of the art in design and execution. 

Associations have been formed for improvements in the Arts of Design. The first was 
organized in Philadelphia iu 1791, by C. W. Peale, in connection with Ceracchi, the ItaUan 
sculptor. It failed. In 1802 the American Academy of Fine Arts was organized in the city of 
New York, and in 1807 the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, yet in existence, was estab- 
lished in Philadelphia. In 1826 the American Academy of Fine Arts was supersedad by the 
National Academy of Design, in the city of New York, wliich is now a flourishing institution. 

In education and literature our progress has kept paca with other things. At the very 
beginning of settlements, the common school was mada tha spacial care of the State in New 
England. Not so much attention was given to this m attar elsowhere in the Colonies. Tha 
need of higher institutions of learning was early felt ; anl eightaaa years after tha landing of 
the Pilgrims from the May-Floiver, Harvard Collega was f o-onded. When tha war for inde- 
pendence began there were nine colleges in the Colonies, namely, Harvard at Cambridge, 
Mass. ; WiUiam and Mary at WiUiamsburg, Va. ; Yale at New Haven, Conn. ; CoUega of New 
J ersey, at Princeton ; University of Pennsylvania, at Philadelphia ; King's (now Colmnbia) 
i)i the city of New York ; Brown University at Providence, R. I. ; Dartmouth at Hanover, 
N. H. ; and Rutgers at New Brunswick, N. J. There are now about 300 coUeges in the United 
States. 

At the period of the Revolution, teaching in the common schools was very meagre, and 
remained so for fuU thirty years. Only reading, spelling, and arithmetic were regularly 
^Saught. The Psalter, the New Testament, and the Bible constituted the reading-books. No 
iistory was read ; no geography or grammar were taught ; and imtil the putting forth of 
Webster's Spelling Book in 1783, pronunciation was left to the Juagment of teachers. That 
book produced a revolution. 

As the nation advanced in wealth and intelligence, the necessity for correct popular educa- 
tion became more and more manifest, and associated efforts were made for the improvement 
of the schools by providing for the training of teachers, imder the respective pha.ses of Teachers' 
Associations, Educational Periodicals, Normal Schools, and Teachers' Institutes. Tlie first of 
these societies in this country was the "Middlesex County Association for the Improvement of 
Common Schools," established at Middletown, Connecticut, in 1799. But little of importance 
was done in that direction imtil within the last forty-five years. Now provision is made in 
all sections of the Union, not only for the support of common schools, but for traiuing-schools 
for teachers. Since the Civil War, great efforts have been made to establish common school 



SUPPLEMENT. 



systems in the late slave-labor States, that should include among the beneficiaries the colored 
population. Much has been done in that regard. 

Very great improvements have been made in the organization and discipline of the pulj^ie 
schools in cities within the last thirty years. Free schools are rapidly spreading their benefi- 
cent influence over the whole Union, and in some States laws have been made that compel all 
children of a certain age to go to school. Institutions for the special cultm-e of young women 
in all that pertatos to college education, have been established withiu a few years. The pioneer 
in this work is Vassar CoUege, at Poughkeepsie, N. Y., which was firet opened in the year 1865. 
Besides the ordinary means for education, others have been established for special purposes. 
There are Law, Scientific, Medical, Theological, MUitary, Commercial, and Agricultural 
Schools, and seminaries for the deal, dumb, and blind. In many States school district libra- 
ries have been established. There are continually enlarging means provided for the education 
of the whole people. Edmimd Bm-ke said, " Education is the cheap defence of nations." 

Our literature is as varied as the tastes of the people. No subject escapes the attention of 
oiu- native scholars and authors. At the period of the Revolution, books were few in variety 
and niunbers. A larger portion of them were devoted to theological subjects. Booksellers 
were few, and were only found in the larger cities. Various subjects were discussed in pam- 
phlets — not generally in newspapers as now. The editions of books were small, and as stereo- 
typing was unknown, they became rare in a few years, because there was only a costly way 
of reproduction. 

In the year 1801, a new impetus was given to the book trade by the formation of the 
" American Company of Booksellers "—a kind of "union." Twenty years later competition 
broke up the association. Before the "War of 1812 the book trade in the United States was 
small. School books only had very large sales. "Webster's Spelling Book was an example of 
the increasing demand for such helps to education. Dm-ing the twenty years he was engaged 
on his Dictionary, the income from his Spelling Book supported him and his family. It was 
pubhshed in 1783, and its sales have continually increased to the present time, when they 
amount to over 1,000,000 copies a year. Other school books of every kind now have an im- 
mense annual circulation. The general book trade in this coimtry is now immense in the- 
number of volmnes issued and the capital and labor employed. Readers are rapidly increasing. 
An ardent thirst for knowledge or entertainment to be found in books, magazines, and news- 
papers, makes a very large demand for these vehicles, wMle, at the same time, they produce 

widespread inteUigence. The magazine 
literature, now generally healthful, is a 
powerful coadjutor of books in this popu- 
lar culture; and the newspaper, not always 
so healthful, supplies the daUy and weekly 
demand for ephemerals in literature and 
general knowledge. To supply that de- 
mand required great improvements in 
printing machinery, and these have been 
suppUed. 

The printing press at the time of the 
Revolution is shown in that used by 
Franklin, in which the pressure force was 
obtained by means of a. screw. The ink 
was apphed by huge balls ; and an expert 
workman could fimiish about fifty im- 
pressions an hom-. This was improved by 
Earl Stanhope in 1815, by substituting for 
the screw a jointed lever. Then came 
inking machines, and one man could work 
off 250 copies an hour. Years passed on, 
and the cylinder press was invented ; and 
in 1847 it was perfected by Richard M. 
Hoe, of New York. This has been fur- 
ther improved lately, and a prmting press is now used which will strike off 15,000 newspapers, 
printed on both sides, every hour. 

The nawspapers prmted in the United States at the beginning of the Revolution were few 
in number, small in size, and very meagre in information of any kind. They were — » 




niANKLIN'S PRINTING PRESS. 



^EE NATIONAL PROGRESS. XXxi 

weekly, semi-weekly, and tri-weekly. The first daily newspaper issued in this country was the 
"American DaUy Advertiser," established in Philadelphia in 1781 In 1775 there were 37 news- 
paiJers and periodicals in the United States, with an aggregate issue tliat year of 1,200,000 copies. 
In 1870 the number of daily newspapers in the United States was 543; and of weeklies, 4,425. 
Of the dailies, 800,000,000 were issued that year ; of the weeklies, 600,000,000, and of other 
serial pubhcations 100,000,000, making an aggregate of full 1,500,000,000 copies. To these 
figures should be made a large addition at the close of 1875. There are now about forty news- 
papers in the United States which have existed over fifty years. 

In the providing of means for moral and religious culture and benevolent enterprises, there 
has been great progress in this country duriag the century now closing. The various religious 
denominations have increased in membership fully in proportion to th(j increase of population. 
Asylums of every kind for the unfortmiate and friendless have bc-en multiplied in an equal 
ratio, and provision is made for all. 

One of the most conspicuous examples of the growth of our republic is presented by the 
postal service. Dr. Franklin had been Colonial Postmaster-General, and he was appointed to 
the same office for one yeai- by the Continental Congress in the Summer of 1775. He held the 
position a little more than a year, and at the end of his official term there were about 50 post- 
offices in the United States. All the accounts of the General Post-Office Department during 
that period were contained in a small book consisting of about two quires of foolscap paper, 
which is preserved in the Department at Wasliington City. Through all the gloomy years of 
the weak Confederacy the business of the Department was comparatively light ; and when the 
national government began its career in 1789 there were only about seventy-five post-offices,, 
with an aggregate length of post-roads of about 1,900 miles. The annual income was §28,000, 
and the annual expenditm'es were $32,000. The mails were carried by postmen on horseback, 
and sometimes on foot. Now the number of post-offices is over 33,000 ; the aggregate length 
of post-routes 256,000 miles ; the annual revenue $23,000,000, and the annual expenditures $29,- 
000,000. 

"We may safely claim for om* people and coimtry a progress in all that constitutes a vigorous 
and prosperous nation during the centmy just passed, equal, if not superior to that of any 
other on the globe. And to the inventive genius ani^. skill of the Americans may be fairly 
awarded a large share of the honor acquired by f<he construction of machinery which has so 
largely taken the place of manual labor. In that progress ths American c'tizen beholds a 
tangible prophecy of a brilliant future for his country. 

"We have confined our statements concerning the progress of our country since 1776 to 
the period of one hundred years ending in 18TG. Since then that progress has been still 
more remarkable. The census of 1880 shows the number of the population to bo more 
than fifty million, and the products of its great industrial interests vastly increased in 
quantity and value. Our public debt is rapidly diminishing ; the sentiment of national 
unity is pervading every portion of the Republic more and more, and emigration (which 
in 1881-82 amounted to about one million persons) is adding wealth and strength to the 
nation. The United States now (1882) is the freest and richest nation on the face of the 
earth. 



I N" DE X 



Abtnakes Indians, Tribes of, 17, 22. 
Abkecromrie, General, his expedition, 191. 
Aboriginals of America, 9, 38. Taken to England. 53. 
Acadia, settlement of, 80, 121. Annexed to the British 
realm, 186. The name of, changed to Nova Scotia, 132. 
Hppedition against, 185. 
Accohannock Indians, 20. 
Ac^omac Indians, 20. 
Act of Supremacy, 75. 

Adams John, defends Cant. Preston, 2^2. Member of 
the first Continental Congress, 588. Suggests the 
appointment of Washington asOonimander-iii-Chief, 
238. On the Committee to draft the Declaration of 
Independence, 251, 252. 589. Signer of it, 602. Chair- 
man of the Board of "War. 294. On the Committee to 
confer wiih Lord Howe, 257. Commissioner of tlie 
TreatT of Peace. 848. First Minister to Great Britain, 
349. "Vice-President, 364. Ee-electod, 377. President 
of United States, 382, 383. Death of, 457. Notices of, 
383, 589. 
Adaus, John Quinct, his letter to Jefferson on the 
embargo, 403. Envoy, 419. Commissioner at Ghent, 
443. Secretary of State, 447. His treaty with Spain, 
451. President of the United States, 454. Noti<5e of, 
454. 
Adams, Samuel, 219, 221, 227, 234. 
Adams, William, British Commissioner, 443. 
Addison, Fy. C , Commissioner at Panama. 
Admiralty, Massachusetts Board of, 307. Continental 

Board of, 80S. 
Aqua Nueva. 485. 

Aix-la-Ohapelle, Peace of, 138. Conference at, respect- 
in? Cuba, 522, 
Alabama, Stale of, 448. 

Alabama Indiana, In the Creelc Confederacy, 30. 
Alabama, Confederate cruiser, 641. 
Alabama, Secession of, 547. In possession of Union. 

Army, 605. 
Albany, 144. Dutch Fort and Store House at, 72,140, 

Walloons at, 73. 
Albemarle, steam ram, 704. 
Albert, Prince, and tiie World's Fair, 517. 
Aleutian Islands, 11. 
Alexander, Sie William, Earl of Stirling, SO. See 

Stirling. 
Alexander, son of Massasoit, 124. 
Algerine Pirates, 381, 444. 445. 

Algiers, The United States at war with, 390, 445. 
Decatur at, 445. Peace between the United States 
and, 881. 
Algcmquin Indians, Discovery of the, 17. Their tribes 
and territory, 17, With Samuel Champlain, 59. In 
the Indian confederacy to exterminate the white 
people, 18. 
Alien Laio of the United States, 386. 
Allatoona Pass, 699. 

Alleghany Mountains, Extent and name of the, 19. 
Allen, Ethan, Colonel, 284. At Montreal, 240. Notice of, 

240. 
Allen, Colonel, in the Indian war in 1813, 416, 418. 
Allen, Captain, of the brig Argus, 429. 
Amboy, New Jersey. 
Ambbistbr, Robert C, 448, 451. 
AnuUa Island, 443. 



America, Discovery of, 34. Origin of the nam», 41 
First colony in, 42. Intercourse of, with the Cla 
World, 11. 

American Agriculture, 457. Association, 228 Col- 
onies, cost of, to England, 206. Commerce, nrotected 
in 1801, 390, 391. Manufactures, 447. System 458 459 
Party, 531. i < • 

Ames, Fisher, Notice of, 380. 

A.MUERST, Jeffrey, Lord, his expedition against Louis- 
,nn^l'-^^^^®- Captures Ticonderoga, and Crown Point, 
199, 200. At Quebec, 203. Notices of, 196, 199. 

Amidas, Philip, his expedition to America, 55. 

Ampitdia, General, 481. Surrenders Monterey, 484. 

Amfsterdam, Henry Hudson sails from, 59. Charter to 
merchants of. 72, 

Andastes Indians. 19, 23, 24. 

Anderson, John, (Major Andre). 825. 

Andep.son. Robert, Major, 549, 552. 

Andre, Major, Arnold's bargain with, 825. Captured 
and executed ; memorial to, 326. 

Andros, Sir Edmund, arrives at Boston, 129. Impris- 
oned, 130. Governor of New York, 147 : and of New 
Jersey, 159, 160. Usurpations by, 155, 156. 

Androscoggin Indians, 22. 

Annapolis, The Continental Congress meets at, 588. 

Annawan, Famous New England Indian, 21. 

Antietam. Battle of, 689. 

Anville, Duke D., 138. See D'Horville. 

Apache Indians, 33. 



Appalachian Mountains, 19. De Soto crosses the, 44. 

Appomattox C(ru,rt- House, 719. 

Aquiday Island, Indian name of Rhode Island, 91. 

Aqtiinuschiotii. A name given to the Five Nations, 23. 

Arbuthnot, Admiral, besieges Charleston, 309, 810. 
Attacks the French fleet. 330. 

Abbutunot, Alexandep«, 448, 451. 

Archdale, John, Governor, 165, 167. 

Argall, Samuel, Captain, his piracies, 58. Capture 
Pocahontas, 70. Deputy-Governor of Virginia, 7> 
Story of him and D.itch traders, 72. 

" Argus" brig, 429, 430. 

" Ariel " schooner, 420. 

Arista, General, at Matamoras, 481. 

Arkansas Indians, 82. 

Arkansas, State of, 451. Added to the Union, 45 
Secession of, 547, 675. 

Arlington, Earl of, 110. 

Armistead, Major, At Fort M'Henry, 437. 

Armstrong, John, General, 193. Author of the Newburg 
Address, 349. Secretary of War, 426. Notices of, 849, 
426. • 

Armstrong, John, Colonel, 198. 

Army, United States, condition of, 257, 261. Dis- 
banded, 350, 6S1. 

Army, Britis/i, in America, number of men in the, 253, 
Sums granted for the, 206. State of, 28.5. 

Arnold, Benedict, Gov. of Rhode Island, 158. 
Arnold, Benedict, General, at Fort Stanwix, 273; Lake 
Champlain, 234,261 ; Penn's House, 162 i Philadelphia, 
287; Quebec, wounded, 241, 242; Ridgefield, 270; 
Saratoga, 282. Reprimanded by Washinston, 825. 
Treason of, 824, 325. 326. Escapes' to the Vulture, 826, 
Depredations committed by, in Virginia, 830 ; and in 
New England, 340. 



XXXIV 



INDEX. 



Articles of Confederation, 266, 267, 353, 355. 

AsiiiiURTON, Lord, 472. 

AsiiE, General, 295. Miss and Colonel Tarleton, 332. 

Axhley River, Qi.9Q. 

Asuiiiiboin Indians, 31, 32. 

AsroR. John Jacob, his trading station, 479 

A/fii/pdscas Indians. 17. 

Atkinson. Henry. General, 463. 

Atlanta, 6G5. 7llO. Battle at, 701. 703. 

Athnitlo Cable, 728. 

AtllM-o. Defeat of Santa Anna at, 49T. 

Attainder, Bill of, CI 9. 

Attiotiandiron Indians, 23. 

Attucks, Crispus. 221. 

Auffusta, Georgia, Captured by Lee, 336, 337. 

Austin, Ann. the Quakeress, 122. 

Austin, Stephen F., 477. 

Austria, Consul General of. and Martin Koszta, 518. 

Autossee. Ala., Battle at, 428. 

Avalon, Territory of, 81. 

AvERii-L, W. W.," Gen., Kaids of, 660, 697. 

Axel. Count, 98. 

Ayllon, See. D'Ayllon. 



Baoon, Lord, his expedition to New Foundland, 74. 

Baoon, Nathaniel, 110, 111. 112. 

Bainbridge, Commodore, Protects Am. Com. 390, 391, 

Captured by Tripolitans, 391. Notice of, 391. 
Baldwin, Abraham, 856, 629. 
Balfour, Colonel, at Charleston. 337. 
Baltimore, Lord, 152, 209. 
Baltimore, Jld, Capt. John Smith on the site of, 67. 

Gen. Eoss approaches, 486, 437. Congress meets at, 

262. Mass.achiisetts troops attacked in, 556. 
BalVs Bluff, Buttle of. 535. 
Bank, Of Massachnseits, 872. National, 372. Of New 

York. 872. Of North America, 329, 872. 
Banks, N. P., Gen., 624. Commander at New Orleans, 

636. 644, 677, 6S4. 686. 
Baptists, the, compelled to pav fines, in Virginia, 110. 
Barhary Powers, The U. S. at war with, 890. 
Barclay, Egbert. Governor of New Jersey, 160. 
Barclay, Commodore, 420. His tribute to Commodore 

Perry, 428. 
Barlow, Artiiup^ his expedition to America, 55. 
Barlow, Joel. 899. 

Barney, Commodore, his flotilla, 436. Notice of, 436. 
Baree, Colonel, 217, 225. 282. 
Barron. Commodore, 401. 
Barry, Captain. 308. 
Barton, William. Colonel, 271. 
Bartram, John, 210. 
Bassett, ETCHARn.856. 
Bayard, Jambs A., Envoy, 419, 448, 542. 
Bear Tribe of Indians; 15. 
Beaufort Island. 98. 

Beaufort, U. S. Army takes possession of, 583. 
Beaumarchais. M., 266. 

Beauregard. P. G., General, 553, 601, 603, 712. 
Bedell, Colonel, 240. 
Bedford, Gunning, jr.. 356, 629. 
Beek>na7i'8 Swamp, 148. 
Beers, Captain. 126. 
Belcher, Governor, 1.36. 178. 
Belgium, Treaty with, 469. 
Belknap, Jeremy, Dr., 57. 
Bell, John, Secretary of War, 474, 542. 
Bell, Church, removed from Deerfleld to Caughna- 

waga, 135. 
Bellemon't, Earl of, 194. 
Belt, Wampum, 18. 
Bemis's Heights, Battle of, 231. 
Bbnnet, Eichard, 109. 
Bentonville. Battle near, 714. 
Berkeley, Lord, 95, 159. 

Berkeley, Sir William, 98, 108, 110, 111, 112. 
Berkeley, Admiral. 4iil. 
Bermuda Islands, Gates, Newport, and Somers wrecked 

on the, 68. 
Bermuda Hundred, 691. 
Bernard, Governor, 220. 
Bethlehem. La Fayette at, 278. 
Beverly, Eobert, Major, 112. 
Bible, the. The Statute book in Conn., 154. 
Biddle. Edward. 586. 
BxDDLB, Captain, 308. 



Big Bethel, Battle at, 562. 

Bill of Rights of the Continental Congress, 288, 

BiLLiNGE, Edward. 160. 

BiLLOP, Captain, 257. 

Bingham, Captain, 407. 

Birmingham Meeting House, 273. 

Blackfeet Indians. 33. 

Black Hawk, 18, 32. 46.3. 

Black Hawk War, 463. 

Black Rock. Village, burnt, 427. 

Blackstone, William, Eev., 89. 

Black Warrior, Steam Ship, 519. 

Blair, John, 856, 869. 

Blakeley, Captain, 440. 

Blennbuhasset. 397. 

Block. Adrian, 72, 82. 

Blockade Riinyiers, 708. 

Block House, Burnefs 192. 

Block Island, Origin of the name of, 87. 

Bloemart, Samuel, 1.39. 

Bloody Creek, Connecticut, 126. 

Bloodi/ Marsh. Florida, 173. 

Bloody Pond, 190. 

Bloomfield, Joseph, 410. 

Blount, William, 355, 856. 

Blucher, 431. 

Blythb, Captain, 430. 

Board, of Admiralty, See Admiralty. Of Trade, ISS, 
184. Of trade and plantations, 134. Of war, appointed 
by Congress, 294. 

Bolivar, General, 457. 

Bonaparte, Napoleon, Emperor, 399. His decrees at 
Berlin, 400 ; Milan, 402 ; and Eambouillet, 406. Treaty 
with, 386, 603. 

'■'■Bonhomme Richard,'''' 307. 

Booksellers in the American Colonies, 179. 

Boone, Daniel. 300. 

Booth, Wilkes, Assassin, 720. 

Bosoawen. Admiral, 189, 195, 196. 

Boston, Mass, Norwegians explore the region near, 
85. Founded. 118. Expedition from, to Port Eoyal, 
1-35, 186. Eevolutiouary proceedings there, 221. 
Boston, Port Bill, 225, 226. Boston Neck, 229. Forti- 
fied by Gage, 229. Cannonaded, 247. Evacuated by 
the British. 247. 

Bonquet, Colonel, 19, 198. At Pittsburg, 205. Notle« 
of, 205. 

BowDoiN, Governor, .353. 

''Boxer:' United States Brig, 430. 

Boyd, Colonel, 295. 

Boyd, John. 319. 

Braddock, Edward, General, 1 St Meeting with the 
Governors of the Colonies. 185. Expedition to Foiv 
Du Quesne, 186. Death of, 186. 

Bradford, William, Governor, 11.5, 118. 

Bradrord, William, Editor of the New York Gazett4, 
150. 

Bradstreet, Colonel, 197. 198. At Detroit, 205. 

Bragg, General, 632, 684, 63S, 663, 665, 666. 

Brandywine, Battle of, 273. 

" Brandytoine:'' frigate, 453. 

Brant, Joseph, 296; 291. 

Brashear City, 684. 

Brearly, David, 356. 

Breed's Hill, 234. 

Brent, Charles, 489. 

Brewster, Elder, 77, 116. 

Bbeyman, Colonel, 277. 

Bridgewater, Battle at, 4-33. 

Bristol, England, Cabot sails from, 46. 

British Agent« among the Indians, 373. Fleet, depre- 
dations by the, in the United States, 430 ; and in 1814, 
436, 437. Fleet on Lake Champlain, 485. Claims to 
Oregon, 479. 

Brock, Sir Isaac, General, 411, 414. 

Brooke, Lord, 85. 

Brookh, Colonel, 437. 

Brookfield, Connecticut, 126. 

Brooklyn, New York, Walloons at, 73. 

Brown, Jacob, 856. 

Brown, Jacob, General, at Chippewa, 433. At Pre»- 
cott, 426. At Sackett's Harbor, 426, 482. Notice of, 
4,33. 

Brown, John, Eaid of. 533. Notice of, 538. 

Brown, John. 308. 

Brown, Major, at Fort Brown, 4S2. Mortally wounded, 
492. 

Bbown, General, (British), 836, 387. 






I 



INDEX. 



Browne. John and Samuel, 119, 

BuoHANAN, James, Secretary of State, 47S. Elected 
President, 530. Notice of, 530. Cabinet of, 532. 

BucKNBR, General, 596. 

BuENA Vista, Battle of, 485. 

BuELL, Don Carlos, 591, 595, 003, 606, 033. 

Buffalo, New York, burnt, 42". 

BtrroKD, Abraham, Colonel, his troops slaughtered by 
Tarleton, 313. 

Bull, Brought to America by Columbus, 41. 

BuWs Run, First battle of, 503. 

Blinker's Hill, 234. Battle of. 236. 

Burgesses, The Virginia House of, 106. 

BuRGOYNE, John. General, 234. At Fort Edward, 276, 
277. At Lake Champlain, 272. At St. John, 271. At 
Tieonderoga, 275. Surrenders at Saratoga, 2S1. Dines 
with General Schuyler, 261. Notice of, 282. 

BiTKKE, Edmund, 217, 221, 2S2. 

Burlington, Count Donop at, 262. 

BuKNET, Peter H., 499. 

BuRNSiDE, Ambrose E., General, 589, 606. Head quarters 
of, 607. Takes command of the Army, 631. Is super- 
seded, 631, 664. 

Burns, Anthony, Fugitive Slave, arrest of, 519. 

Burr, Aaron, in Arnold's expedition to Quebec, 241. 
Vice-President, 388. Duel with Hamilton, 361, 396. 
Proposed invasion of Mexico, 390. Tried for treason, 
898. His conduct towards Blennerhasset, 397. Notice 
of, 397. 

Bl'rrington, Geokgi:, G^^vi-rnor of North Croliana, 171. 

Burroughs, Kev„ The. executed as a wizard, 133. 

Burrows, Lieut., Captures the British brig " Boxer," 
432. 

Busiinell. David, his torpodo, 252. 

Bute, Lord, 213. 

Butler. Ben.iamin. F., 453.579, 609. C<immander of New 
Orleans. 6 11, 632, 6:». Relieved of the Department of 
the Gulf, 636, 638. 691. Colored troops under, 696. 

Butler, John, Colonel, 278, 290. 

Butler, Pierce, 356. 

Butler, Walter N., 291. 

Butler, Zebulon, Colonel, Notice o^ 290. 

Byron, Admiral, 305. Succeeds Lord Howe, 292. 



c. 

J.vBOT, George, 444. 

Cabot, John, Notice of, 60. 

Cabot, Sebastian, his commission from Henry VII, 46. 
Sails for America in 1497, 46. His second expedition, 
in 1498, 47. Discovers Labrador, Newfoundland and 
portions of New England, 41. Explores the coast from 
L:ibrailor to the Carolinas. 47. Navigates the northern 
coast of Hudson's Bay. Explores the coast of Brazil, 
47. Discovers the Riodela Plata. 47. Notices of, 47, 60. 

Cadwalader, Lambert, Colonel, 355. 

CIadwallader, John, General, at Trenton, 263, 263. 

Vahokia, captured by Major Clarke, 303. 

Cahukia Indians, 19. 

Caldwell, Rev. Dr.. 334 

Caldwell, James, 221. 

" Caledonia " The, one of Perry's vessels, 420. 

Calef. Mr., of Boston, 133. 

Calhoun. John C, his views of the war of 1812, 409. 
Secretary of War, 447. Vice-president, 454,459. No- 
tices of, 458, 459. 

California, Conquest of, 487. Discovery of Gold, 497. 
Admitted to the Union, 601. Excludes slavery, 499. 

Calumets, Indian, 14. 

Calvert, Charles, 153. 

Calvert, George, Lord Baltimore, 81. 

Calvert, Leonard, 82, 151. 

Cambridge, England, Meeting at, respecting the Ply- 
mouth Colony, lis. 

Cambridge, Massachusetts, founded, 118. The college 
founded at, 121. Provincial Congress at, 230. 

Camden, New Jersey, 93. 

Campbell, William, Colonel. 319. 

Campisell, Colonel. (British), 291, 292, 294. 

Camp Douglas. Prisoners at, 710. 

Canada, Attempted conquest of, 131, 136. Pitt's scheme 
for conquering, 199. Measures for the conquest of. 
203. 204. End of French dominion in, 22. Address of 
Congress to the people of, 239. Pro|)osed invasion of, 
194 Hull's invasion of. 410. Wellington's troops 
sent to, 432 Revolutionary movement in, 471, 472. 

Canary Islands, Columbus delayed at the, 39. 
Oanby, E. K. 8., General, 591, 686. 



Canonchet, Treaty of Peace with, 125. His perfidy and 
death, 127. '^ ' 

Canonicus, Narraganset chief, 21, 90, 91, 115. 

Canterbwy, Archbishop of, 121. 

Cape Ann, colony at. 110. Bajuiljjr, 86. Breton, 137, 
133. Charles, origin of the name, 64. Cabot passes. 
46. Cod, origin ot the name. 57. Farewell, 46. Fear," 
origin of the name, 55. Of Good Hope, origin of tlia 
name, 37. Henlopen, 93. Henry, origin of the namv, 
64 May, .85; purchase of, and origin of the name 94. 

Capital of the United States, S^S. 

Caramelli, Hamet, 392,395. 

Carcass, described, 236. 

Cardo.v, Lord. 166. 

Carleton, Sir Guy, Governor of Canada, 373. At St 
John's, 240. At Quebec, 241. His propositions for 
reconciliation, 345. 

Carlisle, Earl of. Commissioner to America, 1778, 286. 

Carnif ex Ferry, Battle at, 578. 

Carolina, Amillas and Barlow off the shores of, 55. 
Colonies founded n, 62. Origin of the name, 50, 55, 
98. The colonies of, 97, 16.3, 164; Separated, 171. 
Grant from Parliament to, 206. Opposes taxation, 223. 

Carolina, Fort, 98. 

• Caroline,''^ steamboat, 472. 

Carpenter's Hall, Philadelphia, 288, 588. 

Carr, Sir Robert, 123. 

Carroll, Charles, of CarroUton, 252, 602. 

Carroll, Daniel, 356. 

Carroll, John, Archbishop. 354. Notice of, 354. 

Carteret, Sir George, 98, 159. Purchases New Jersey. 
159. •" 

Carteret, Philip, Governor of New Jersey, 94, 159. 

Carteret County Colony. 98, 164. 16.^ 

Cartier, James, his expeditions, 48,49. 

Caktwright, George, 123. 

Carver, John, Governor, 77, 73. His interview with 
Mftssasoit, 114 Death of, 115. Notice of, 78. 

Cascades. Oregon, Attacked by Indians, 528. 

Casco Village, attacked by the French and Indians, 131. 

Casey, General, 616. 

Cass, Lewis, General, at Detroit, 424. Candidate for 
the Presidency, 1848, 498. 

Castillon, General, deserts Colonel Walker at Rivas, 
525. 

Castine, Baron de. 134. 

Castine. Admiral Griffith seizes the town of, 1814, 433. 

Castle William, 220. 

Castro, General, 487. 

Caswell, Richard, 356, 588. 

Catawba Indians, 26, 27. Allies of Nort'd Carolina Col- 
ony, 168, 170. 

Catawba River, 21. 

Cat Island, See Guanaham.a. 

Cattle, First, in Connecticut, 86. Newfoundland and 
Nova Scotia, 47. 

Caughnawaga, The church bell at, 135. 

Cayuga Indians, 2S, 24. 

Cedar Mountain, Battle at, 624. 

Cen.iHS, 371, 388. 

Cent, U. S Coin, 372. 

Champe, Serjeant, attempts to capture Arnold, 326. 

Champlain, Samuel, his expedition, 59. Discovers 
Lake Champlain, 59 ; and Lake Huron 59. His pub- 
lications, 59. 

Champlain, Lake, discovered. 59. 

Chancellorsville, Battle of, 649. 

Chanco, 106. 

Chandler, Notice of, 420. 

Charles I, of England, 74 107. 116. 

Charles II.. of Ensland, 109.110. His Gifts to Lord CuK 
pejiper, and the Karl of Arlington, 110. Grants a new- 
charter to Connecticut, 155. Declares the Massachu- 
setts charter void, 129. Makes judges independent of 
the people. 110. Reproaches Governor Berkeley, 112. 
Gives New Netheriand to his brother James, 144 
Death of, 113. 

Charles IX., of France, 49, 51. His commission to Co. 
lisnv, 50. 

Charleston, South Carolin.a, founded, 99, 117. Frcneh 
and Spanish expedition against, 109. Seige of, 809, 
311. Captured by the British, 312. Evacuated, 843. 
at Oglethorpe, 100, 703. \ 

Charlesto-wn, Mass., 230. 

Charter of Liberties, William Penn's, 162, Of New 
York. 147. 

Chatham, The Earl of. 218. His conciliatory mcaaurea, 
231. His denunciations in the House of Lords, 23fc 



INDEX. 



His letter to Sayre, 228. His opinion of the Conti- 
nental Congress, 228. Death of, 286. Notice of, 217. 
See Pitt. 

CuASE, Salmon P., Secretary of the Treasury, 560. Notice 
of, 560, 679. Chief-Justice of Uniied States, 732. 

Chattanooga, 606, 682. 

Chauncky, Commodore, 420, 425. 

Cheksehan, General Montgomery's Aid, 242. 

Chepultepec, Battle of, 1S4T, 494. 

Cheraw Indians. 20. 

Cherry Valley devastated, 290. 

" Cherub'''' sloop-of-war, 431. 

Cherubusco, General Scott at, 493. 

Chestnut, James, 546. 

Chesapeake Bay e.\i)lored by Captain John Smith, 
67. Gosnold in the, 64. Indians on the, 20. 

" Chesapeake " frigate, 401, 429. 

Chester, Pennsylvania. William Penn at, 97. 

ChevaiKB-de-frise 6.&s,mhiii,2'~iA. At Charleston, 311. 

Chevy Chase. 233. 

Cyiewing Tobacco invented by white people, 14. 

Chicago, Wigwam at, 543. Convention at, 710. 

Chickahominy Ri/ver, 66, 616. Battle of the, 620, 692. 

" Chickamauga,'" Confederate pirate, 714. Battle of, 
666. 

Chickasaw Bayov,. Battle at, 643. 

Chickasaw Indians, 29, 30, 44. 

Chickasaw River, 29. 

CiiicKELEY, Sir Henry, 113. 

Child, Scandinavian, born on Ehode Island, 85. 

Childs, Colonel, at Piiebla, 494. 

Chimney Point, 1S9. 

Chippe,,:.! luilians. 17, 18, 24, 205. 

Chij,j,.,r,i. llattle ol. 433. 

Choc!,iir /,,,/unis, i:9, 30. 

Choiraii Jii</iitii^, 23. 

Chowan River, 97. 

Christians, Indian, converted by French Jesuit8,22. 

Christian Commission, 723. 

Christina, in Deleware, 93. 

Cheonicle, William, Mayor, 319. 

Chrysler's Field, Battle of, 427. 

Church Ben.jamin, Captain, l-z7. Death of, 127. 

Chv/rch of England in the reign of Charles II., 110. 
Established in Maryland, 154. In North Carolina, 
168. In South Carolina. 169. 

Church and Utate, in Massachusetts, 118. 

Churchmen, persecuted bv Puritans, 119. 

Cincinnati Society, instituted, 352. Order of the, 352. 

Cipher Writing of the New York tories, 309. 

City Hall of New York, 366. City Hall Park, 148. 

Civilization, New period of, in America, 52. 

Claiborne, William C. C, Governor, 440. Notice of, 
441. 

Clans, Indian, 17. 

Clarendon, Lord, 98. 

Clarendon County Colony, 98. 

Clark, Abraham, 856, 602. 

Clarke, George K., General, his operations in South 
Carolina and Georgia, 314, 315, 819, 336. His expedi- 
tion against the Indians, 303. Captures Kaskaskia, 
and Cahokia, 303. Notice of, 303. 

Clarke, Captain, his tour of exploration with Captain 
Lewis, in 1604, 479. 

Clay, Green, General, at Fort Meigs, 418, 419. 

Clay, Henry, United States Commissioner at Ghent, 
443. Nominated for the Presidency, 454. Secretary 
of State. 454. His compromise "bill. 464. Nominated 
for the Presidency, 478. Notice of, 500. 

Clay, Lieutenant-Colonel, 486. 

ClAYBORNE, WiLLlA.M, 82, 151. 

" Clermont," Fulton's first steamboat, 399. 

Cleveland, Benjamin, 319. 

Clinch. General, 467. 

Clingman, William, 611. 

Clinton, De Witt, 416. His part in the Erie Canal, 457. 
Notice of, 457. 

Clinton, Sir Henry, General, at Boston, 234, 236. Joins 
Sir Peter Parker, 248. On Long Island, 253. At New 
York, 272. Captures Forts Clinton and Montgomery, 
283. At Monmouth, 287. His moonlight dispatch, 
288. His m.arauding expeditions, 296. Succeed- Howe, 
287. Evacuates Rhode Island, and proceeds to the 
Carolinas, 306, 309. In New Jersey. 320. Deceives 
Washington, 320. At the Seice of Charleston, 309. 
Sends emissaries to the Pennsylvania mutineers, 828, 
329. 

CLiNTgN, James, General, at Tioga Point, 304. 



Clinton, George, Governor, 287. Vice-President, 896, 
404. With General Knox, 350. Notice of, 350. 

Clvmeb. George, 356, 602, 629. 

Cobb, Howeli., General, 715. 

CocKBUBN, Admiral, His marauding expeditions, 430 
440. 

Cod Fishery, 47, 116. 

CODDINGTON, WiLLIAM, 91. 

Coffee, Gener-al, in the expedition against the Creeks, 
42S. Notice of, 428. 

Coffey, Colonel, 675. 

Coins and Currency of the United States, 872. Coppei 
coins, 372. 

CoLDEN, Cadwalladee, 215. 

CoLiGNY, Admiral, 49. 50. Sir Walter Ealeigh studies 
the art of war with, .52. The friend of Huguenots, 49. 

Colleton, James, Governor, 166. 

Colleton, Sir John, 98. 

Collier, Sir George, 297. 

Colonies, .American, History of the, 51, 52, 104, 174. 
American population of the, 179. New Kngland, pro- 
posed Union of the, 121 ; the Union dissolved, 122. 

Colony, The earliest in America, 42. 

Colorado, 678. 

Columbia, District of, 38S. 

Columbia River, 279. 

Columbia, S. C, Fall of, 712. 

Columbus, Christopher, 37. His voyage to Iceland, 37. 
Queen Isabella fits out a fleet for him, 87. He sails 
from Palos, 39. His voyages and discoveries, persecu- 
tions and death, 41. 

Comanche Jndians.ZZ. Territory of the, 45. 

Comhahee River, D'Ayllon iit the mouth of, 43. 

Commerce of the American colonies. Eeetrictions im- 
posed on the, 212. American. 381, 382, 390, 391 ; Pro- 
tected. 391 ; Injured by England and France, 400, 401 ; 
Injured by pirates, 453. Of Great Britain and the 
United States, 367. 

Committee of Safety of Massachusetts, 234. Com- 
mittees of Correspondence, 226. 

Como, Witchcriift at, 13'2. 

Company of Free Traders, 96. 

"Concessions," The, of Berkeley and Carteret. 159. 

Confederation, American Articles of, 206. 267, 353, 355. 

Confederation of New England colonies, 121. 

Confederates, Finances of, 679. 

Confederacy, Excitement in, 545. 

Congaree Indians hostile to the South Carolina col- 
onies, 170. 

Congress, First Continental, at Philadelphia, 227, 228. 
Second Continental, 215, 238; Appoints a Committee 
to confer with Washington, 239; Measures of, 245; 
Armed M.arine of, 807; Committee on Naval Affairs 
307; Continental Naval Board of Marine Committee, 
and Bo.ard of Admiralty of, 308; Resolution on Inde- 
pendence, and Committee on the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence, 251; Committee for conferring with Lord 
Howe, 259; Sends an embassy to France and to other 
European courts, 266; Rejects Lord North's Concilia- 
tory Bills, 286. Of the United States, resolution of the, 
toallowiiiilitaryoflacersh.alf pay for life, 349 ; Disbands 
the army, 350 ; Efforts of, at New York. 862 ; Recom- 
mends the appointment of a day forth^imogiving and 
prayer, 870; Measures of the, respecting Revenues, 
366,367: Extraordinary Sessions of, 475." Provincial, 
at Cambridge, Massachusetts, 230; Makes salutary 
change in postal arrangements, 507; feends steam ves- 
sels to coast of China and round'Cape Horn, 515 ; Re- 
construction policy of, 726; Passes tenure of office bill, 
729; Imjieaches the President, 729, 732. 

Congress Mexican, Assumes provisional authority, 497. 

"Congress," frigate, 414. 

Connecticut, Origin and signification of the word, 85. 
Settlement of. 62. Pequod Indians in, 21. History of 
the Colony of, 161 Constitution of, 154. Charter of, 
155. Takes part in the wiir against King Philip, 155. 
Refuses to surrender its charter, 156. Joins the con- 
federacy of colonies, 121. Grant to, from Parliament, 
206. 

Connecticut River, Discovered by Block, 72, 82. Col- 
ony at the, 85, 86. 

Canonchet, 21. 

Connor, Commodore. Sails for the Gulf of Mexico, 480. 
Captures Tampico, Tabasco, and Tuspan, 485. At 
Vera Cruz. 489. 

'■'■Constellation." frigate, 382. Captures the frigate L' 
Insurgente, 885. Action of the, with the frigate L» 
I Vengeance, 385. 



INDEX 



xxxvn 



ComUtution of the. United States, "Washington sug- 
gests a convention on the subject of a; history of 
the, 356; articles of the, 359, 360, 361. Amendments, 758. 

Constitution of Government, Pilgrim, 78. 

"ConsUtntion," frigate, 382,415, 440. Action of the, with 
the Guerriere, 414. 

Continental, Army, 238. Congress: see Congress. 
Money, 245; Depreciation of, 293, 328; Counterfeited, 

CoNTRECCEUR, M., attacks the Ohio Company's men, 
182. 

Contreras, Battle of, 1847. 493. 

Convention on the Articles of Confederation, 356. At 
Albany, 1754, 183. 

CoNWAT, Thomas, General, 2S5. 

Conway, Henry Seymour, General, his motion in Par- 
liament, 346, 347. 

CooDE, The insurgent, 153. 

Copley, John Singleton, 209. 

Copley, Lionel, Royal Governor, 153. 

CoppiN, Pilot of the Mayflower, 78. 

Copp's mil, 235. 

Cooper, Ashley, Lord, 98. 

Cooper River, Origin of the name, 99. 

Cordova, Francisco Fernankez de, discovers Mexico, 
43. 

Coree Indians, 17, 20, 57. Conspire against the North 
Carolina settlements, 168. 

Corinth, Battle at, 635. Evacuation of; 604. 

CoRNBURY, Lord, 149, 161. 

Cornplanter, 26, 304. 

Cornstalk unites with Logan against the white men, 
20. His bravery and death, 20. 

Cornwallis, Charles, Lord, on Long Island, 253, 254. 
Captures Fort Lee, 259. Pursues Washington, 260. At 
New York, 262. At Princeton, 268. At Charleston, 
311. In South Carolina, 313. At Sander's Creek, 315. 
In command of the British Army at the South, 315. 
At Charlotte, 318. At Winnsborough, 319. Suc- 
ceeds Phillips, 3-30. Pursues Morgan, 332. Abandons 
North Carolina, 834. At Wilmington and Petersburg, 
388. His operations in Virginia, 388. Surrenders at 
Yorktown, 341. His cruelty, 818. Notice of, 818. 

Corpus Christi village, Mexico, 480. 

Cortez, Fernando, his expedition to Mexico, 43. De- 
thrones Montezuma, 10. Notice of, 43. 

CoRTOREAL, Gasper, his expedition to America, in 1500, 
47. 

Cosby, William, Governor, 150. 

Costa Rica declares war against Nicaragua, 1856, 526. 

Cotton, Rev. Mr., 118. Comes to America, 86. 

Cotton, Cultivation of, in the United States, 368. 

Council of Plymo'uth, 117, 120. 

Council Indian, how composed, 16. 

"Countess of Scarborough'''' captured by Paul Jones, 
307. 

Counties, Origin of, 73. 

Cowpem, Battle of, 331, 832. 

Cows brought to America by Columbus, 41. Taken to 
Virginia, 68. 

CoxE, Tench, 869. Notice of, 368. 

Craig, Major, 345. 

Craik, Dr.. his anecdote of Washington's escape from 
death, 186. « 

Crampten, Mr., British Minister, dismissed, 528, 529. 

Craney Island, 430. 

Craven, Lord, 98. 

Craven, Charles, Governor of South Carolina, 170. 

Crawford, William H., Minister to France, 429. Secre- 
tary of the Treasury, 447. Nominated for the Presi- 
dency, 454. 

Creek Indians, 29, 30, 108, 168, 427, 428, 455, 456. 

Creoles, Origin of the, 41. 

'■^Orescent City,'''' steamboat, 512. 

Crimea, the. Enlistments in American cities, for the 
English Army in, 52a 

Crittenden, George B., Colonel, 593. 

Crittenden, William L., at Cuba; executed, 508. 

Croghan, Major, Notice of, 420. 

Cromwell, Oliver, 155. His supposed intention to mi- 
grate to America, 120, 130. Opposed by Virginia, 108. 
Notice of, 108. 

Cross of St. George, 144. Of St. Andrew. 144. Pine, 
erected by De Soto, 44. Planted on the shore of Gaspfe 
inlet. 48. 

Crow Indians, 82, 33. 

Crottm Point, 199. Champlain at, 59. Johnson s expe- 
dition against, 185. 



Cruger, Lieutenant-Colonel, 385. In South Carolina, SIS 

Cuba. Discovery of, 40. Fears of invasion of, 60a 

Diflicullies about settlement of, 520. 
CuLPBPi-EB,Lord, Grants to bv Charles XL, 110. 
Culpepper John, 99. The revolt led by, 164. Lays out 

the city of Charleston. 165. 
Currency, National, Of the United States, 872. ^ 

Curtin, Governor, calls out Militia, 653, 
Curtis, S. R., General. 691. 
Gushing, Caleb, 540. 
Gushing, Thomas, 588. 
Gushing, William, Judge, 369 
CusHMAN, Robert, 77. 
" Cyane,'" frigate, 440. 

D. 

Dacres, Captain, 414. 

Dade, Francis L., Major, massacred, 467. Notice o^ 

Dahcotah Indians, 81, 32. 

Dale, Sir Thomas, arrives at Jamestown, with Bupnlles. 

69. Governorof Virginia, 70. 
Daulgren, Admiral, 688, 673. 
Dalton, Georgia, Raid at, 682. 
Banvers, Witchcraft at, 138. 
Dare, ELKA^0R, her daughter Virginia, 56. 
Dartmouth College, 178. 
Daughters of Liberty, 216. 
Davenport, John, 88. 
Davie, William Richardson, Colonel, 318, 856. Envoy 

to France, 385. 
Davis, Jefferson, Secretary of War, 528. Notice o/ 

547, 569. Elected President of Confederacy, 641. 

Flies from Richmond, 718. Taken prisoner, 722. 
Davis, Jefeesos C, 691. 
D'Hanville, 188. 
D'Ayllon, Lucas Vasquez, 42. 
Dayton, Jonathan, 356, 629. 
Dbane, Silas, Member of the first Continental Congress, 

588. Chairman of the Committee on Naval Aitfairs, 

807, 808. American Agent in France, 266. On th« 

American embassy to France, 266. 
Dearborn, Henry, 390. Commands the Array of the 

North, 412. At York, Canada, 425. Notice of, 410. 
Debt of United States, 679. In 1868, 734. 
Decatur, Stephen, Commodore, 415. In the Mediter- 
ranean ; at Algiers; at Tunis, 445. His exploit at 

Tripoli, notice of, 392. Captured, 440. 
Declaration of Rights, 215. 
Deerfield, 126. Attacked by Eouville, 135. 
De Hart, John, 588. 
De Heister, 253, 254. 
De Kalb, Baron, in the Southern campaign, 809, 814. 

Death of, 816. Notice of, 316. 
Dblancey, James, Governor, 183, 185. Favors a Stamp 

Act, 541. 
Delaware, Settlement of, 92. Colonies, 144. Swedes 

in, 62. Yields to the Dutch, 147. An independent 

colony, 159. 
Delaware Bay, Verrazani anchors in, 43. 
Delaware Indians, 17, 21, 161,86:3. 
De la Wakr, Lord, Governor of Virginia, 68. At James- 
town, 69 Character of; death of, 69. 
Delft-Haven. Holland, Puritans sail from, 77. 
De Monts, 58. 
Deseret, the country of the Mormons ; signification o( 

the name, 504. 
De Soto, Ferdinand, 44, 45. 
D'EsTAiNG ; see Estaing. 
Detroit, Capture of, 424. 
Devens, Charles, General, 585. 
De Vries, Captain, 92. His plantation, 140. 
Dexter, Samuel, 889. 
Dickenson, John, Chairman of the convention on tb* 

Constitution of the United States, 855. His letter! 

DiESKAU, Baron, Fate of his expedition, 1S9, 190. Death 

of, 190. 
Dime, United States coin, 372. 
Dintoiddie Court Iforne, 717. 
DiNWiDDiE, Robert, Governor, 188. His letter to St 

Pierre. 181. His independent companies, 184. 
Directory. The French, 888, 884. 
DoBBS, Governor. 185. 
Dohb's Ferry. 257. 
Dollar, American, 372. 



XXXVlll 



INDEX. 



Dominion, The Old: see Old Dominion. 

I>onelson, Fort, Victory at, 597. 

DoNGAN, Thomas, Governor, 147. 

Doniphan, Oolom-1. 4SS. 459. 

DoNOP, Count, at Burlington, 262. Death of, 295. 

Douglas, Stephen A., 541. 

Dover, attacked by the French and Indians, 16S9, 130. 

DowNiE, Commodore, 434. Death of, 435. 

Dpaft, 657. 

Dkake, Sir Francis, 56. At St. Augustine, 57. Dis- 
covers the tobacco-plant ; introduces it into England, 
70. 

Drummond. General, 432, 43-3. At Burlington Heights, 
433. At Fort Erie, 4;J4. 

DRUMMONn. William. Rev., 111. Executed, 97,112. 

DtTANB, William J., refuses to withdraw the Govern- 
ment funds from the United States Bank, 465. 

DucHE, Jacob, Eev., 22S. 

Dudley, Joseph, 129. 

Dudley, Thomas, 117. 

Dunbar, Colonel, 186. 

Dunmore, Lord, 237, 243, 589. 

DuPONT, S. F., Commodore, 582, 609,671. 

DusTAN, Mrs, captured by the French and Indians 
134. 

Dutch, The, their maritime enterprise, 71. East India 
Company of, send a ship to the Hudson River, 71. 
Purchase Manhattan Island from the Manhattan 
Indians, 21. Settle at New Amsterdam, 62. In New 
Netherland, send a friendly salutation to the Massa- 
chusetts Colony. 118. Their friendly intercourse with 
the Puritans, S5. Oppose Captain Holmes, 85. 
Purchase Long Island, 114. Claim jurisdiction upon 
the Connecticut, 121. Settle in South Carolina, 99. 
Take possession of New York, 147. 

Dutch East India Company, 59, 71. 

Dutch West India Company, 72, 93, 139, 144. 

Dutch Point, Connecticut, 85. 



Eagle, American gold coin, 372. 

Early, General, 695, 698. 

East India Company send tea to America ; notice of 
the, 224. 

East Jersey, \^. 

Eaton, Theophilus, Governor, 88,154. 

Eaton, William. Captain, Consul at Tripoli, 392. 

Edda, Indian, 23. 

Eden, William, 2S6. 

Edenton, North Carolina, First popular assembly at, 93. 

Edisto Island, 609. 

Education fostered by the Massachusetts Colony, 
121. In the colonies, 178. 

Edwards, Jonathan, 210. 

Effingham, Governor, Character of, 113. 

Elba. Bonaparte at, 431. 

MectoT's for President and Vice-President of the United 
States, 861. 

Eliot, John, Rev., 123. 

Elizabeth, Queen of England, 51, 76. 

Elizabeth Islands discovered, 57. 

Elizabethtoimi, New Jersey, 159. 

Ellbt, Charles, Jr., Colonel, 605. 

Elliott, Susanna, Mis., 305. 

Ellison's Mill, Battle at, 619, 620. 

Ellsworth, Colonel, takes first secession flag, 564. 

Ellsworth, Oliver, 356, 359. Envoy to France, 1799, 
385. On the Judicary of the United States, 368. No- 
tice of, 359. 

Elm, Penn's Treaty, 96, 161. 

Mnaneipatian, Proclamation of, 639, 640, 680. 

Endicot, John, 117. 

England, see Great Britain. 

^'■Enterprise''' brig, 430. 

" Epervier " brig, 440. 

Erie Indians, 19, 2-3. 

EHe Canal, 456, 457. 

Erie, Lake ; See Lake Erie. 

Emucfau, Battle at. 428. 

Erskine, General, at Trenton, 268. 

Erskinb, Mr., British Minister to the United States, 406. 

Esopua Indians, 148. 

EaqwimAiivx Indians, 17, 509. 

" Essex" frigate, 414, 430, 431. 

Estaing. Count d\ sent with a fleet to America, 286. 
His fleet disabled by a storm. 289. In the West Indies, 



292. Off tho coast of Georgia, 305. At the siege of 

Savannan, 305. Notice of, 289. 
Estramndura, Cortez died at, in 1554, 43. 
Etehemin Indians, 22. 
Eutaio Springs, Battle of, -338. 
Everett, Edward, Mass., 542. 
EwELL, General. 617, 654. 
Ewino, J-a.mes, General, at Trenton, 263. 
Exeter, New Hampshire, founded, 80. 



Fairfield, Connecticut, 88. 

Fair Oaks, Battle at, 619. 

Falls of the James River, 105, 108. 

Famine in the Virginia Colony, 69. 

Farragut, Commodore, 610, 630, 632, 678, 708. 

Fauchet, M., succeeds M. Genet, 378. 

Faulkner, Major, 430. 

Faust, John, his printing office, 62. 

Fayetteville, Engagement at, 675. 

Federalist Party, 377. 

" Federalist,'' The, 861. 

Felucca Gun-boat, 401. 

Fendall, Governor. 153. 

Fenian Brotherhood, 728. 

Ferdinand and Isabella, 38, 60. 

Ferguson, Adam, 286. 

Ferguson, Captain, 386. 

Ferguson, Mrs., her attempt to bribe General Reed, 
286. 

Ferguson, Patrice, Major, at King's Mountain, 1780, 
319. Death and grave of, 319. 

Fernando de Taos, Massacre at, 489. 

Ferrar, Nicholas, 107. 

Few, William, 355, 856. 

Fidelity, The Order of, 852. 

Fillmore, Millard, Vice-President, 498. President, 501. 
Notice of. 501. Cabinet of; 502. Close of administra- 
tion of, 512. 

Fine Arts in America, 209. 

Finances of the United States, 679. 

Fisher, Mary, Quakeress, arrives at Boston, 122. 

Fisheries, 349. Prohibitory Act of Parliament respect- 
ing the, 231. Difficulties between Great Britain and 
the United States respecting the, 511, 523. 

Fishing Creek. 27. 

FiTzsiMONS, Thomas, 856, 629. 

Five Nations, The, History of, 28. Captain John 
Smith's friendly relations with, 67. Allies of Governor 
Winthroj), 131. Attempts of James IL to introduce 
French priests among them, 147. Their treaty of 
neutrality, 185. 

Flag Culpepper, 248. Royal, of Great Britain, 144. 
Union, 245. Of the thirteen stripes, unfurled by 
Washington at Cambridge, 144. 

Flag, Secession, 555. 

Flathead Indians, 83. 

Ylax, American. 206. 

Fleming, Captain, Death of, 269. 

Fletcher, Benjamin, Governor, 149, 156, 184 

F^int River, De Soto on the banks qf the, 44 

Floating Batteries described, 201. 

Florida. Discovery of; origin of the name, 42. Narvaez, 
Governor of, 43, 44. Melendez's expedition to, 50, 51. 
Oglethorpe's expedition to, 172. Ceded to England, 
204. Restored to Spain, 349. Ceded to the United 
States, 1819, 451. SUite of, added to the Union, 478. 
Secession of, 547. 

FooTE, A. H., Commander, 595. Wounded, 605. 

Forts: — Adams, 874. Amsterdam, 139. Andrew, 173. 
Bower, 438. Brooke, 467. Brown, 481. Butler, 677. 
Carolina, 51, 98. Casimir, 142. 143. Clinton, 283, 824. 
Cumberland, 198. Darling, 694 Dearborn, 412. De- 
fiance, 374, 416. Deposit, 416. De Russy, 677, 
Diego, 172. Donelson. 595, Drane, 467. Du Quesne, 
27,182,185,186. Edward, 1S9, 190, 191, 192, 275. Erie. 
433, 434 Fisher, 71.3. Forty Fort, 290. Frederica. 
178. Frontenac, 198. Gaines, 709. Galphin, 836. 
George, on Lake George, 198. 414, 425. 426, 427, 
George, New York City, 248, 351. Granby, 235. Gris- 
wold^840. Hamilton, 258. Harrison. 416, Hatteras.. 
580. Henry, 595. Hindman, 643. Independence. 20, 
220. J.-ickson, 610. Kins, 467. La F.avette. 298, 586. 
Leavenworth, 4^3, 486. Le Bceuf, ISl. Lee, 259. Ly- 
man, 189. Mackinaw. 411. Macon. 607. Maiden, 410. 
Meigs, 418. Mercer, 274, 275. Mifflin, 274 M'Hearjr, 



INDEX. 



xxxix 



437. Mlmms, 427. Monroe. 615, 695. Montccomery 
2S3. Morgan, 438. Moosa, 172. MotU-, 33.5. Moultrie. 
249, 810, 468. Nassau. 72, 93, 94. Necessity, ISiS! 
Niagara, 199, 200, 427. Ninetv-Si.\-, 316, 3;J5 336. 
Ontario, 189, 192. Orange, 72, 139, 144, 14S. Oswego. 
189, 192. Pemberton, 643. Pepperell, 1S9. Pickens, 
580. Pillow, 605, 682. Pitt, 198. Powhatan, 691. 
Presque Isle, 181. Prince George, 335. Putnam, 2S3, 
324. Eecov-erv, 374. Republic. 617. St. Fredericli, 
189. St. Philip. 440, 610. Sandusky, 419. Schuyler, 
278. Simon, 173. Stanwix, 278. Stcadman, "717. 
Stephenson, 419. Stoddart, 398. Sulliv.in, 249. 
Trumbull, 340. Venango, 181. Wagner, 673, 674. 
Warren, 587. Washinirton, 258. Watson, 335, Wayne, 
374, 416. William, 173. William Henry, 191, 194. 

Forrest, N. B., Guerilla Chief, 632, 681. 

Foster, Genenil, 671. 

Fox, Charles, his opposition to the measures of Great 
Britain, 282. His remark respecting the battle of 
Guilford, 333. 

Fox, George, visits his Quaker brethren in Americii, 
94. Notice of, 122. 

Fox Indians, 17. Conspire against the English, 205. 
See Sacs and Poxes. 

France, First American embassy to, 266. Alliance of, 
with the United States, 283. Fleet of, sent to America, 
286. Secret treaty of, with Spain, 306. Depredations 
by, on American commerce, 382. Fleet of, attacked 
by Arbuthnot, 3.30. War with United States, 385. Its 
commerce, 401. Negotiation with United States, 406. 
United States Minister to, 429. Claims of the United 
States against, 403. 

France, Emperor of, 727. 

Francis I., his expedition to America, 47. 

Franklin, Benjamin, 210. His plan of Colonial Confed- 
eration, 183. A Colonel, 193. At Boston, on the sub- 
ject of the invasion of Canada, 2-39. Circulates in Eng- 
land the State-papers of the Continental Congress, 230. 
On the Committee to confer with Lord Howe, 257. On 
the Committe to draft a Declaration of Independence, 
2.51, 252. On the embassy to Fr.ince. Issues commis- 
sions to Naval Officers,30S. Commissioner on the Treaty 
of Peace, 348. The Pope's Nuncio makes overtures to, 
respecting an Apostolic Vicar in the United States, 
35.3. Member of the Convention on the Articles of 
Confederation, 356. His proposition respecting prayers 
at the Convention, 359. Ilis account of the father of 
Cotton Mather, 134. 

Franklin, General, 625, 684. 

Franklin, Sir John, Search for, 509, 510. 

Franklin, Battle at, 705. 

Frankfort, Capture of, 633. 

Eraser, General, 276. 

Frederick the Great, his opinion of Washington, 
269. 

Frederick III. of Prussia, 431. 

Frid erickaburg, 625. Battle of, 631. Battle near, 692. 

Free Institutions, Growth of, 114. 

Freedom, Ideas of, in Massachusetts, 118. 

Fremont, John Charles, Colonel, his exploits in Califor- 
nia, 487; at Los Angeles; at San Gabriel; deprived of 
his commission, 487. Senator from California, 499. 
Notice of, 487. Explorations of 515, 574. 

French, Parker H., Colonel, 427. 

French Colony on Sable Island, 57. Acadia, 121. 
Possessions in North America, between the Penobscot 
and St Croix, 129. In Carolina, 55. Pvevolution, 377. 
Settlement, the earliest in the New World, 53, 59. 
Spoliations, 468. 

French, The, in Canada, discover the Algonquins, 17. 
First visit of, to the Sioux Indians, 32. Earliest Ex- 
plorers of the Middle and Upper Mississippi, 31. Sub- 
jugation of, in North America, 204 Assailed by the 
Natchez Indians, 29. Their expedition against Charles- 
ton, 169. 

French and Indian War, 19, 104, 138, 179. 

Fretichtoicn, burned. 430. 

Fresh Water River, 85. 

FkobiSher, Sir Martin, his expedition, 52. The ship 
used bv, 60. Notice of, 51. 

'Frolic^ brig. 415. 

Frontenac. M.. Governor of Canad.-i, 131. Burns Sche- 
nectadv, 130, 1.31, Repelled by Schuyler, 149. 

Fry, JosHiTA A., Colonel. 182. Death of, 183. 

Fugitive Slave Law. 507, 521. 527. 

Fulton, Robert, Notice of, 398, 399. 

"Fundamental Constitutions," The, of Shaftsbury and 
Locke, 164, 165, 167. 

51 



I Funeral Ceremonies, Indian, 15. Pyre Algonquin. 15. 
Furs, Trade in, 72, 116, 139, 140. b h , 



G. 

Gaedsden, Christopher, Lieutenant Governor, 812. 

Gage, Thomas, General, A Lieutenant-Colonel at the 
battle of Monongahela, 186. Governor of Montreal, 
20-3. Enters Boston with soldiers, 220. Governor of 
Massachusetts, 226. Sends his secretary to dissolve 
the General Assembly o( Massachusetts, 227. Fortifies 
Boston. 229. Notice of, 229. 

Gaines, Edmund P., Gener.il, Arrests Aaron Burr, 898. 
At Fort Erie, 733. His expedition acainst the Semi- 
noles; joined by General Jackson, 448. Assailed by 
the Seminoles, near Withlacoochee, 467. Notices of. 
448, 467. 

Gallatin, Albbrt, Member of the House of Representa- 
tives, 389. Secretary of the Treasury, 390, 406. Envoy, 
419. United States Commissioner at Ghent, 1814, 483. 

Galloway, Joseph, 26U, 58S. 

Galveston, Pirates and slave-dealers at, 443. 

Gambier, Lord, British Coinmis.sioner at Ghent, 1314 
4;3:3. 

Gansevoort, Colonel, At Fort Stanwix, 278. 

Garangida, 26. 

Gardiner, Colonel, 295. 

Gaspe Inlet, 48. 

'■■Gaspe,'" schooner, 223. 310. 

Gates, Horatio, General, His appointment as Adjutant 
General, 238. Succeeds General Thomas, 261. Super- 
sedes General Sehuyler, 277. At Bemis's Heights, 278. 
Bursoyne surrenders to, 281. Chairman of the Board 
of War, 294. His flight to Charlotte, 316. Trial of, 
330. Notice of, 314. 

Gates, Sir Thomas, 68. At Jamestown. Returns to 
Kngland. 

Geiger, E.MILY, 3-37. 

Genet, Edmund Chaele.s, Mini-ster from France to the 
United States, 377. Fits out privateers, 377. Recalled, 
in 1798, 378. Notice of, 877. 

George I, of England, 136, 137. 

George II, of England, Accession of. 187. Charter 
granted by, for the proposed Georgia Colony, 100. 

George III. of England. Accession of, 212. His insan- 
ity, 93. Leaden statue of, at New York, pulled down, 
252. 

Geohje, Prince of Denmark, 136. 

'••George Washington,'' frigate, 891. 

Georgetown, Burnt, 430 

Georgia, Settlement of, 99. Colony in. founded by 
Oglethorpe, 62. Colony of; origin of the name, 100. 
Invaded by the Spaniards, 172. Receives Parliamentary 
aid, 209. Claims of, to Cherokee lands. 461. Contro- 
versy in. coucerning the Creek lands, 455, 456. Seces- 
sion of, 547. Quiet in. 673. 

Gerard, M., French Minister to the United States, 287. 

Germans in North Carolina, 168. 

Gerrv, Elbridge. 856. Envoy, 385. Vice-President. 497. 

Gebmaine, George, Lord. 282, 346. 

Germantoien, Battle of. 275. 

Gettysburg. Battle of, 655. 

Gibson. C. W., Major, 683. 

Giddings, Major, at Cen^lvo, 486. 

Gilbert, Edward, 499. 

Gilbert, Sir Humphrey, 52, 63. His expedition to 
America ; notice of, 52. 

Gilbert, Sir John, 63. 

Gilbert, Raleigh, 63. 

Oilman, Nicholas, 3.'.6, 629. 

GiLMOBE, Q. A., General, 607, 678, 

Gist, General, 847. 

Glendale, Battle at, 621. 

Gloucester, Virginia, fortified by Cornwallis, 8M. 

Goats, The first, taken to Virginia, 68. 

Godfrey, Thomas. 209. 

GoDYN, Samuel, 92. 1-39. 

GoKFE, William, The regicide judge, 123, 126. 

Gold, Thirst for, in the Virginia Colony, 6T. Dl». 
covery of, California, 497. 

Golden Circle. Knights of, 656. 6S7, 710. 

Goldsboro\ Raid on, 671. Battle at, 714. 

Goldsmiths among the Virginia colonists, 67. 

Gore, Christopher, 222. 

Georges, Sib Fernando, 68, 79, 129. Associated wilk 
John Mason. 79. 

GOBHAM, NATUAiilEI., 356, 859. 



xl 



INDEX, 



GosNOU), Baktholomew, 57, 63, 65. His discoveries; 
his fort, 57. Deatii of, 65. 

GouLDBOtntNE, Uenet, British Commissioner at Ghent, 
443. 

GO0KGB8. Dominic db. Surprises and captures Fort Car- 
olina, 51. 

Government, Three forms of, In America, 211. 

Graffenreid, Count, 168. 

Grant, James, Colonel, 204. 

Grant, General, (British), 253. His reply to Kail, 262. 

Grant, Ulysses S., General, 595, makes vigorous pre- 
parations for ascending the Tennessee river, 601, 634, 
642. Begins siege of Vicksburs, 645, 666, 67S. Com- 
mander-in-chief, 6S1, 689, 690, 692, 69.3, 716, 719. Fare- 
well address of, 72.3. Placed in charge of the War 
Department, 730. Elected President of the U. S. 733. 

Grabse, Count de, 839, 840. 

Graves, Admiral, 840. 

Gray, Samuel, killed at Boston, by Preston's men, 221. 

Grayson, William, 355. 

Great Britain acknowledges the Independence of the 
United States, 848. Non-intercourse with the United 
States, 899. Injures the commerce of the United 
States, 401. Navy of, 414. At war with the United 
States, 409 ; Treaty of Peace, 443. Claims of, to terri- 
tory in North America, 17, 63, ISO, 478, 479. Eoyal 
standard of, 144. Ill feeling against, 511. Friendly 
relations with disturbed, 526. Her sympathy with re 
bellion, 561. Demands return of Mason and Slidell, 
588. 

Great Horseshoe Bend, General Jackson at the, 1841, 
428. 

Great Kanawha River, Battle at the, 19 

Green, Roger, 97. 

Green Bay, Indians on the western shores of, 18. 

Green, Christopher, Lieutenant-Colonel, of Ehode 
Island, 275. 

Greene, Nathaniel, General, appointed Brigadier- 
General, 23S. At Fort Lee, 259. At Trenton, 259. Ac- 
companies La Fayette to Rhode Island, 289. At 
Springfield, 820. Succeeds Gates ; his operation.s, 
830. Joins Morgan at the Yadkin; his retreat from 
Virginia, 332. Opposes Cornwallis at Guilford court- 
house, 3.33. Pursues Cornwallis ; at the b.attle of 

■ Hobkirk's Hill; his letter to M. Luzerne, 334. At 
the siege of Fort Ninety-Six, 836. Pursues Stewart, 
337. At the battle of Eutaw Springs, 338. Receives 
intelligence of the capture of Cornwallis, 345. Takes 
possession of Charleston, 347. 

Greene, Zechariah, Rev., 252. ^ 

Greenmlle, Treaty of, in 1795, 24. * 

Grbnville, George, Author of the Stamp Act, 221. 

Grenville, Sir Richard, his Expedition to America, 55, 
56. 

Grenville, Georgia, 213. 

Grey, General, his Marauding Expeditton, 290. 

Grey, Captain, of Boston, 479. 

Gridley, Richard, Engineer of the Continental Army, 
188, 190, 19S. 234. 

Grierson, Colonel, Raid of, 645. 

Grier, Mrs., Judge Henry's account of, 241. 

Griffith, Admiral, at Castlne, 428. 

Grijalva, Juan de, his Expedition to Mexico, 43. 

Groveton, Battle near, 626. 

Guadalupe Hidalgo, Treaty of, 521. 

Guanahama, The place of Columbus's first landing in 
America, 40. 

GuDRiDA, Wife of a Scandinavian Navigator, 85. 

Guess, George, a native Cherokee, invents an alphabet 
of his language, 28. 

Guilford, Battle of, 333. 

G^n-boats of the United States, 401. 

" GnsTAvus Adolpuus," The assumed name of Arnold, 
92, 325. 

GwiNN, William M., Senator, 499. 



JTabeas Corpus, Suspension of writ of, 656. 

Harries Bluff, 648. 

Hakluyt, Richard, 63. 

Hale, Sir Matthew, condemns persons accused of 

witchcraft, 132. 
Hale, Nathan, Captain, executed, 258. 
" Half-Moon:' The, 48, 59, 71. 
Halleok, H. W., General, 595, 591, 623, 625, 6.53. 
Hamilton, Alexander, General, Washington's favorite 

Aid and Secretary, 360, 861. Member of the Con- 



vention on the Articles of C-onfederation, 1787, 856: 
Signer of the Constitution of the United States. Ona 
of the authors of "The Federalist," 361. Secretary ot 
the Treasury, 370; his financial Reports, 370, 371. 
His Scheme respecting Public Lands, 872. His dis- 
agreement with Jell'erson, 374. His duel with Burr, 
396. Notice of, 860. 

Hampden, John, 85. His supposed intention to migrate 
to America, 120. 

Hampton, Wade, General, 410, 427. 

Hampton Roads, The British fleet in, 430. Armament 
in, 582. A naval force in, 613. 

Hancock, John, at Salem, 230. Gage's purpose to 
hang him, 234. Leads troops to Rhode Island, 281; 
His sloop '• Liberty," 220. Notice of, 280, 231. 

Hancock, General, 654, 689. 

Hansford, Charles, executed, 112. 

Hardy, Commodore, 430, 437. 

Harlem Heights, Washington at, 257. 

Harlem Plains, Skirmish at, 258. 

Haemer, General, his Expedition against the Indiana, 

Harper's Ferry, Insurrection, 488. In 1861, 557, 629. 

Harper, John. A., 409. 

Harrington, Jonathan, 222. 

Harriot, his " Report on the new found land of Vir- 
ginia;" notice of, 55, 56. 

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, National Convention at, 458. 

Harrison, Benjamin, at Boston, 239. 

Harrison's Landing, 622. 

Habrison, Willi a-m Henry, at the battle of Tippecanocj 
408. Commands the army of the North-east, 412. 
His Expedition against the Indians, 416. At Fort 
Meigs, 418. Att.aeks Maiden, 423. President of the 
United States; his administration, 473. Death of, 
475. Notice of, 473. 

Hartford, Connecticut, 88. Convention at, 444 

Hartley, David, 348. 

Harvard, Ebenezer, 22, 873. 

Harvard, John, Rev., 121. 

Harvard College, 121, 178. 

Harvey, Sir John, 107, 165. Impeached, 207 

Haslett, Colonel, Death of, 269. 

Hittteras Jndians,'H), 55, 167. 

Hatieras Inlet, Fight at, 579. 

Havana, The body of Columbus removed to, 41, 

Haverhill, Massachusetts, 134. 

Haviland, Colonel, 203. 

Havre-de-Grace, Maryland, 82,430. 

Hawley, Jesse, 456. 

Haynb, Isaac, Colonel, 337. 

Hayne, Robert V., 46:3, 464. 

Hayes, J., General. 696. 

llAZZARD, W. W., his plantation, 173. 

Head of Elk, M:iiy land, 340. 

Heald, Captain, 412. 

Heath, Sir Robert. 97, 9S. 

Heath, Willia.m, General, 238. In the Highlands. 3W. 
At l^eekskill, 260. In New Jersey. 264, 265. 

Heckewelder, his liistoiy of the Indian Nations, 33. 

Heights of Abraham, 202. 

Heintzelman, General, 619. 

Hell Gate, New York, navigated by Block, 72. 

Henderson. General, 483. 

Hendrick, Death of, 190. 

Henry, Prince, of Portugal, patron of navigators, 36. 

Henry IV., of France, his edict of Nantes, 166. 

Henry IV., of Castile and Leon, 38. 

Henry VII., of England, 46. 

Henry VIII., of England, defies the Pope ; Defender 
of the Faith, 75. Revival of an obsolete statute of, 
221. Punishes witchcraft, 182. 

Henry. Patrick, member of the First Continental Con- 
gress, 228. His eloquence, 237. His regiment at the 
battle of the Great Bridge, 243. Member of the Con- 
vention on the Articles of Confederation, 356. De- 
clines the appointment of Envoy to France, 386, 
Notice of, 214. 

Henry, Judge, 241. 

Herkimer, General, At Oriskany, 278. 

Herrera, President, 481. 

Hessians, the, account of, 246. Marauders, 296, 297. 
Capture of, at Trenton, by Washington, 363. Witb 
Buigovne, 281. 

Heyes; Peter, 92, 94. 

Hi-a-wat-ha, Legend of, 23, 24. 

Hichittie Indians, 30. 

HiGGiNSON, Rev. Mr., 117. Death of, 1181 



INDEX. 



xl£^ 



High Bills of Santee, 837. 

Highlanders in Georgia, 171. 

Hill, A. P., General, 619, 693. 

Hill. D. H., General, 619, 620,671. 

miton Head, 704. 

Hind MAN, T. C, 637. 

HiNMAN, CapUiin, 308. 

Hi-o-ka-too. Seneca Chief, 25. 

Hobkiik's Hill, Battle of, 334. 

Hoboken, Slaughter of Indians at, 141. 

HoBOMOK, a famous New England Indian, 21 

Hochelaga, Cartier at, 48. 

HoKB, General, 704. 

Hood, J. B., General, 700, 702, 705. 

Hooker, J., General, 616, 622, 629. Placed in command 
of the armv, 681, 647. Resigns command of the army, 
653,667,668,701. 

HooKEK, Thomas, Rev., his colony, 86. 

HoLBORNE, Adtnirai, 194. 

Holland, Expedition from, to America, 71, 72. Wariivith 
England, 147, 327. 

Holmes, Admiral, 201. 

Holmes, W illiam. Captain, 85. 

Hopkins, Edward. Governor, 88, 155. 

Hopkins, Ezek. first Commander-in-chief of the Amer- 
ican Navy, 308. 

Hopkinson, Francis, Notice of, 28.'). 

HoPKiNSON. Joseph, author of '• Hail Columbia," 285. 
" Hornet," sloop of war, 414, 428, 429. 

Horry, Colonel, 336. 

Horse, The first taken to Virginia, 63. Columbus takes 
horses to America, 41. Taken from Cuba to Florida; 
their fate, 44. Taken by Do Soto to Florida, 44. 

HoTHAM, Admiral, 292. 

Housatonic Indians, 189. 

House oj Burgesses, Virginia, the beginning of the, 
106. 

House of Representatives of Massachusetts Colony, 122. 

Houston, William, 856. 

Houston, William Churchill, 356. 

Houston, General, at the battle of San Jacinto, 478. 

Howard. John Eager, Colonel, at the battle of the Cow- 
pens, 332. 

Howard, Admiral, 57. 

Howard, O. O., General, 701, 70.3. 

HowK, George, Lord, Notice of, 197. 

Howe, Richard, Lord, at Boston, 247. At New York, 
252. Prepares to attack New York ; paroles General 
Sullivan; asks Congress to appoint a Committee of 
Conference, 257. His letter to Washington, 253. Meets 
the Committee appointed by Congress, 257. In Rari- 
tan Bay, 287. His fleet disabled by a storm in, 289. 

Howe, Robert, General. 244, 292, 298. Suppresses the 
mutiny at Pompton, 329. 

Howe, Sir William, General. 202, 234. 235. At Quebec, 
202. At New York, 2.52. His Proclamation, 260. 
Perplexes Washington, 272. At Brandy wine, 273. At 
Elkton, 173. Attempts to entice Washington from 
his encampment, 183. Knighted, after the battle of 
Brooklyn, 273. 

Huamantla, Battle of, 494. 

Hudson, Henry, Captain, his glowing account of his 
discoveries, 71. Fate of, 59. 

HuGER, Colonel, defeated by Tarleton, 311. 

Huguenots, the, Persecution of, in France, 166. Ad- 
miral Colignv, the friend of, 49. In North Carolina, 
16& In South Carolina, 166. Influence of, in Amer- 
io.i, 52. 

Hull, Isaac, Commodore, 414. 

HuLU William, General, 410, 411. 

HuLSEMAN, Chevalier, 510. Letter of, 617. 

Humphrey, Alexander, 80. 

Humphrey. John, 117. 

Hunt, Captain, kidnaps Indians, 74 

Hunter. Robert, Governor, 150. 

" Hunter's Lodges,^'' 472. 

Hunter, General, 693, 60S, 672, 673. 

Huron, Lake: see Lake Huron. 

Huron, King, dies in France. 49. 

Huron Indians, 21, 23. With Samuel Champlain, 59. 

Huron-Iroquois Indians, 22-26. Their territory, 23. 
Their LimiTuage. 12. 

Huron Coxmty, invaded bv the Five Nations. 24. 

Hutchinson, Governor, 222. His famous "Letters" 224, 
225. 

Hutchinson, C.-iptain, 126. 

Hutchinson, Anne, Mrs., 80, 91, 120. Murder of, 141. 

Hutchinson Controversy, 88. 



Iceland, 34, 85. 

Ile-a^io!.- Koix, 208. 

Illinois Indians, 17, IS, 19. Invaded by the Sacs aniT- 

Foxes, 18. 
Illinois, Territory and State of, 890, 44a 
Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, 732. Verdict given, 

Independence, American, General desire for. In 1775. 
250. War for, 229. Asserted by the Committee of 
Conference with Lord Howe, 257. Acknowledged by 
Gre.itBiiuiin,84S. 

Indians alliances against the Colonies, 124 Chiefs . 
dine with Governor Winthrop, 118. Confederacy 
against South Carolina. 170. Presents received froii; , 
Great Britain, 206. Religion, 15. Treaties, 862,86ci- 
Tieaty of Peace, 374 Policy toward, 735, 743. 

Indians, 'I'hu, U. Rescmbl.ance of, to Asiatics, 11. Ac- 
count of the Aboriginal tribes of, 12. Employments of 
women among, 12, 13. Extreme Western, 82, 83. ' 
Population of, in the United States, 82. Their plan 
to exterminate the white people; slaughter of, 106. 
Troublesome in Oregon and Washington Territory,625.. 

Indian W«r, 462. 

Indies, the, Columbus's voyage in qnest of a westera 
passage to, 84. The trade of, monopolized by the- 
IlJilian cities, 36. 

Indigo, American, 206. 

Industry, private, Effects of, in Virginia, and In Plv- 
mouth, 70. 

Ingoldsby, Richard, 158, 150. 

Intolerance in Massachusetts, 118, 119, 128. In Mar«.- 
land, >^ew York, and New England, 182, 183. 

" Intrepid^'' The, Tripolitan vessel, 892. 

loioa Indians, 82. 

Iowa, State of, added to the Union, 478. 

Iron chain across the Hudson, 824 

Iroquois Indians, 24, 31. 

Ikvin, Colonel, at Agua Frio, 486. 

Irvine, William, 885. 

Isabella, Queen, Sister of Henry IV., of Castile tnCr 
Leon, 38. Columbus's per.sonal interview with, 88. 

Italian Cities, their monopoly of the trade of the In- 
dies, 36. 

luka Springs, Battle near, 6.34. 

Izard, General, Succeeds Wilkinson, 482. Notio« ot. 
434. 



Jackson, Ant.rew, General, anecdote of him, when t . 
bov, 314. The mother of. 314 His confidence won bv 
Biirr, 397. His expedition against the Creeks, In 1818, 
428. Storms Pensacola, 4:38. At New Orleans, 438^ 
4:39. His treaty with the Creek Indians, 488. His , 
expedition against the Seminolcs, 443. Captures Pen- 
sacolii,451. Subdues the Seminoles. 80, 4*4, 469, 461. 

Jackson, Stonewall, 573, 624, 625, 629. 

Jackson, T. J., 617. 

Jacksonville, Attack on. 608. 

Jackson, James, Notice of, 847,84a 

Jackson, Robert, 814. 

Jackson borough. South Carolina Legislature at, 888. 

Jalapa, Generals Scott and Twi-rgs at, 489. 490. 

James I, of England, Character of; persecutes PnrS- 
tans, 76. His proposal to contract for the whole croij . 
of tobacco in Virginia, 107. His acts of nsnryatlon Iti • 
Virginia, 107. Death of, 116. Patents granted by,, 
63. 64. 

James II, of England, Accession of; his character, 118,. 
147. Oppressive measures of, 129. His arbitrary pro- 
ceedings respecting the Jerseys, 160. Driven into 
exile, 162. 

Jameson River, Origin of the name, 64. English navi- 
gators enter the, 20, 61. Indians on the, 17. 

James, Colonel, 326. 

Jamestoxon, Virginia, founded, 166. Origin of th« 
name, 64. Cultivation of tobacco at, 70. Famine at, 
saved by Pocahontas, 69; saved by Chanco. 106. Na- 
thaniel Bacon at. 111. Destruction of, by Bacon, 112. 

James Island, Fight at, 674. 

Japan opened to United States trade, 511. Sends Em- 
bassy to United States, 612. 

Jaspep., Sergeiln^ 249,805. 

'•Javar frigate, 415. 

Jay, John, one of the authors of the Federalist, 8*1. 
Commissioner on the Treaty of Peace, 848. Flntc 



■xlii 



INDEX 



Chief Justice of the United States. 369. Special En- 
voy to Great Britain, 3T9. His treaty, 379, 380. Notice 
of, 3T9. 
jBFrRRSON. Thomas, on the Committee to draft the De- 
claratiuu of lnde[iendence, 251. Tarleton's attempt to 
capture, 339. Commissioner on the Treaty of Peace, 
34&. Secretary of Foreign Affairs. 370. His disagree- 
ment with Hamilton, 374. His remarks respecting 
Algerine piracies, 3S1 ; and on Coins and Coinage, 372. 
Vice-President, 3S3. President, 388,396. His embargo, 
402, 403. His account of Logan, 26. Death of, 457. 
Notice of, 3SS, 389. 

Jkffbbts, Colonel 112, 113. 

^Tbnnings, Colonel, 416. 

Jknifeb, Daniel, of St. Thomas, 256. 

Jersey, Grant from Parliamen*- to, 206. West, 189. 
Union of the Jerseys, 161. 

Jersey Prison-Ship, 259. 

Jbssuff, Bashaw of Tripoli, 892. 

Jbsup, Thomas S., at Fort Dade; notice of, 463. 

Jesuits, the. Origin of, 130. Missionaries, 180. Their 
influence over the Indians, 22, 130. 

John, King of Portugal, his expedition to America, 47. 
Names the Cape of Good Hope, 37. 

'*John Adams" friga.te, 438. 

Johnston, Albert Sydney, 594. 

■Johnson, Andrew, appointed provisional Governor of 
Tennessee, 699. Elected Vice-President, 710. Sworn 
as President, 720. Cabinet of, 720. Sketch of, 721. 
Total disregard of the interests of freedmen, 725. Pro- 
claims civil war at an end, 727. Vetoes bill for negro 
suffrage, 728. Impeachment of, 732. Pronounced not 
guilty. 733. Retires from office, 735. 

Johnston, Joseph E., 616, 618, 64.5, 698. 

JoHNSo.v, Isaac, and Lady Arabella, 118. 

Johnson, Sib John, 278, 373. 

Johnson, Sir Nathaniel. Governor, 169. 

Johnson, Richard M., Colonel, 424. Vice-President, 469. 

Johnson, Robert, Governor, 171. 

Johnson, Thomas, nominates Washington as Com- 
mander-in-chief, 288. 

JoHKSON, Sir William, his exploit against Dieskau, 190. 
His expedition aL'ainst Crown Point, 185, 189. Ac- 
companies Prideaux to Fort Niagara, 200. At the bat- 
tle of Quebec. 203. Notice of. 278. 

Johnson, William Samuel. 356. 556, 629. 

Johnstone, George, Commissioner to America, 286. 

J(>neahoro\ (Capture of, 702. 

Jones, John Paul, Commodore, His exploits 306, 307. 
Sails for Holland, 307. His fleet, 308. Congress pre- 
sents a gold medal to, 308. Notice of, 306. 

Jones, Sir William, decides against the Duke of York's 
claim to New Jersey, 160. 

Jones, Captain, of the sloop "Wasp." 415. 

Judiciary the United States, 368, 369. 

JuMONviLLE, M., Death of, 18;3. 

Jury, Trial by, established in the Colony of Virginia, 

K. 

Kane, Elisha Kent, Explorer, Sketch of, 509. 

JCansas, Territory of. 518. Open to slavery. 526. Legis- 
lature of. 628. Violence and bloodshed in, 529 

Kansas Indians, 20, 32. 

Kaskaskia Indians, 19. 

JTaskaskia captured by Major Clarke, 803. 

Xayingehaga Indiaiis, 23. 

Keane, General 489. 

Kkaeney, Stephen W., Colonel, at Santa F6. 486. At 
San Gabriel, 487. Notice of, 486. ' 

Kearny, Philip, 619. Death of, 627. 

"■Kearsarge^'' American man of war, 70S. 

Kegs, Battle of the, 285. 

Keith, Sir William, advises Stamp Act, 541 

Kendall, Amos, Postmaster-General, 470. 

Kenesaw Mountain. 699. 

Kennebec, Sir John Popham at, 63. 

Kensington, Philadelphia, 96. 

Kent Island, 82. 

Kenton, Simon, joins Major Clarke, 303. 

Kentucky added to the Union, 377. Confederates 
'btain foothold in, 593. Lost to Confederates, 698. 
In possession of Union Army, 605. 

Keppel. Admiral, 1S5. 

Kettle Creek, Skirmish at, 295. 

Key, Francis S., 437. 

Kickapoo Indians, 17, 18, 



KroD, Captain, 149. 

KiEFT, Sir William, Governor, 140, 141. 

Kilpatrick, General, 651, 6S8, 702. 

King, Rufus. 356. American Minister at London, 401 
404,446. Notice of, 896. 

King George's War, 136. 

Kino Philip, 21. Arouses the New England tribes 
against the English. 22. His hostility to the White 
Men, 125. His war of extermination, 126, 127. Deifth, 
22, 128. His son, sold as a slave, 128. 

King's Mountain, Major Ferguson at, 319. Battle 
of, 319. 

Kingston, New York. Burned, 288, 297. 

King William's War, 134. 

Kipp's Bay, 258, 

KiRKLAND, Samuel, Rev. Missionary to the Six Na- 
tions; Notice of, 25, 26. 

KUtanning, chastisement of the Indians at, 198. 

Knisteneaux Indians, 17. 

Knowlton, Colonel, Death of, 258. 

Know- Nothings, 529. 

Knox, H?nry, General. Takes possession of Fort 
George, 350, 351. At Washington's last Interview 
with his officers, 352. Secretary" of War, 370. Notice, 
350. 

Knoxville, Saved, 671. 

Knyphausen, General. At Brandywine, 27-3. At 
Springfield, 320. At Westchester, 259. At New York, 

Konoschioni, the name of the Five Nations, 23. 
KosciuszKO, Thaddeus, 386. Notice of, 336. 
Kossuth, Louis, Visit of; 510. 



Labrador^ Discovered by Cabot, 46. Coast of, ex- 
plored by Weymouth, 68. 

LaColle, Battle at, 432. 

Laeonia, Territory of, 79, 80. 

La Fayette, General, His first interview with Wash- 
ington, 272. At Brandywine, 272, 453. At Bethle- 
hem, 273. At Monmouth, 288. In Rhode Island, 289. 
Obtains aid from France, for the American cause, .306. 
His return from France, 321. In Virginia, 330, 339. 
Pursues Cornwallis, 339. Visits the United States, 
453. Lays the corner-stone of a monument to De 
Kalb, 316. Notice of, 278. 

Lake ChamjyJain , Discovered, 59. 

Lake Erie, Battle near, 190. Indians on, 19. 

LakeRuron, Discovered, 59. Indians on, 17. 

Lamb, John, Colonel, 242, 270. 

Lancaster, Massachusetts. Burnt, 127. 

Lander, Gen., 615. 

Lands, Public, of the United States, 372. Indian, 
ceded to the United States, 24. 

Lane, Ralph. Governor, 65. 

Lane, General, At Puebla, 494. 

Langdon, John, 356, 629. 

Languages, Indian, 12. 

Lansing, John J., 356. 

La Place, M., 234. 

Lathrop, Captain, 126. 

Laudonniere. His expedition to America, 60. 

Laurens, Henry, Commissioner on the Treaty cf 
Peace, 348. 

Laurens, John, Colonel, 329. Death of, 348. 

La Vega, General, 482, 483. 

Lawrence, Governor, Expedition against Acadie, 185. 

Lawrence, Ja.mks, Captain, Notice of, 429. 

Lawenece, Richard, Colone', 111. Executed, 112. 

" Lawrence," ship, 420. 

Lear, Tobias, Colonel, Copsul-General in the Mediter- 
ranean, 895. Compelled tc purchase his freedom, 445. 

Ledyard, Willia.m, Colonel, 840. 

Lee, Arthur, American Ambassador to France, 266. 

Lee, Charlks, General, A Captain at Ticonderoga, 
wounded, 197. Major-Genfral, 288. At Boston, 239. 
At New York, 248. At North Castle, 269. At Mon- 
mouth, 288. His letter to W(<yne, 298. 

Lee, Charles. Attorney-General, 1796, 383. Notices 
of, 248, 288. 

Lee, Henry, General, His exploit at Paulus's Hook, 
94, 298. With General Marion, 336. At Fort Ninety- 
six, 3-37. Suppresses the Whiske5 Insurrection, 378. 
His funeral oration on Washington, 8S7. Notice ot; 



INDEX. 



■Aiiir 



Lre, Robekt E., General 1 538, 563, 619, 62S, 631 643 
652,690.718. Surrfiulcr <.f, 719. 

Leb, Uichakd Hf.nry, Uis Kesohition on American In- 
dependence, 250, 251. Notice of, 250. 

Lee, W. H. F.. General , 648. 

Leislek. Jacob, Governor, 131, 148. 

Leitch, Major, Death of, 258. 

Le Mo YNE, James, 50 

Leniii Lenape Indians, 17, 20, 21. 

Leon, Ponce de, General , At Braceti, 488. 

" Leopard " frigate. 402. 

Leslie, General, 332. At Charleston, 347. 

" Levant" sloop-of-war, 440. 

Levi, M. Successor to .Montcalm. 203. 

Lewis, Andrew, General , Notice of, 244. 

Lewis, Colonel, At Frenchtown, 416, 418. 

Lewis and Cl.vrke's Expedition, 395. 

Leioiiimi, Delaware, 92. 94. 430. 

Lewiston, New York. Burnt, 427. 

Lexington, B.attleof, 232. 2;33. 

Lei/den. Netherlands , Puritans at, 77. 

Libby Prison, 662. Plan to blow up, 68S. 

" Liberty " sloop. 220. 

Liberty-pole^ At Plymouth, Massachusetts, 79. 

Ligonia, Agricultural settlement of, 80. 

Lincoln, Abraham, Sketch of, 543. Elected President, 
544. Inaugurated, 551. Calls for troops, 560. Deliv- 
ers Em.ancipation Proclamation, 640. Visits City 
Point, 720. Re-elected, 710. Murdered, 720. 

LiNCOL-N, Earlof, lis. 

Lincoln, Benj.'VMIn, General, At Boundbrook, 270. 
Commands the Southern Army, 204. At Charleston, 
296. Besieges Savannah, 30o. At Charleston. 809. 
Surrenders to Clinton. 311. At the siege of Yorktown, 
342. Suppresses Shay's Rebellion, .353.^ Notice of. 295. 

" IJ' Insurgente " frigate. Captured by ^'Constellation^'' 

" Little Bell,''' sloop of war, 407. 

Little Rock, Arkansas, 675. 676. 

Little Wabash Major Clarke at the, 303. 

Livingston, Edward Author of the penal code of 
Louisiana, 451. His defense of General Jackson. 443. 
Notice of, 451. 452. 

Livingston, Robert, Patroon. 149. 

Livingston. Robert R. His connection with Robert 
Fulton, 399. Notice of. 366. 

Livingston 'William , His Address to the Anglo- .Amer- 
ican Colonies. 22S. Member of the Convention on the 
Articlesof Confederation, 356. 

Llotd, Thomas. 162. 

Locke, John His '-Fundamental Con.stitutions," 99, 
164. 

London Company, Send Henry Hudson on an expedi- 
tion to .America, 59. Send Captain Newport to Roan- 
oke Island. 64. New charter of the. 68. Third char- 
ter of the, 70. Dissolved, SI, 106, 107. London Crys- 
tal palace in 516. 

Longsteeet, Ja.mes, General, 619, 620, 652, 667, 670, 689, 
717. 

Logan. John. Mingo Chief, 20, 26. 27, 

Long Island, m. Granted to the Earl of Stirling, 144. 
Battle of; 254. 

Long Islam!, Indian.'). 21, 141. 

Long Island Sound. Explored by Captain Block, 72. 

Long Parliament. The, 152. Confirms the charter of 
Rhode Island, 157. 

Lords of Trade, 134. 

I' Orient, Naval expedition fitted out at, 308. 

Lookout Mountain, Events at. 66-3. Battle of, 668. 

Los Angelos, Stockton and Fremont take possession of, 
487. 

Lottery authorized by Congress, 293. 

LotTDON, Lord, 191, 192, 193. 194. 

Lome XIV., of Fr.ance, revokes the Edict of Nantes, 166. 
James II., of England, flees to the court of, 130. Ac- 
knowledges Charles Edw.ard, as king of England, 134. 

Louisburg, Captured, 136, 138, 196. 

Louisiamt, Ceded to Fiance in 1800; sold to the United 
States, by Napoleon. 204. Territory ; State, 451. Ad- 
mitted to the Union, 409. Secession of, 547. Opera- 
tions in, 644. 

Loiris Philippe, Driven from the throne of France, 510. 

LovELL Mansfield, General, 609. 

LcTDLOW, Captain, Death of, 429. 

LuDWELL, Philip, 165, 167. 

Liindt/s Lane, Battle of, 4.3.3. 

Lutherans. Persecuted and shaughteren by Melendcz, 51. 

LuzKBKK, M., General Greene's letter to, 334. 



Ltford, Persecuted by the Pilgrims. 119. 
Lyman, General, At Fort Edward. 1S9. 191. 
Lyon, Nathaniel, General 572, 573, 566. 



McClellan, George B., General. 562. .56.1. Takes com- 
mand of U. S. Army, 571, 58.^, 612. 618. 620. Retrnit 
of, 621. Wants more men, 623, 628. Relieved of his 
command, 631. 

McClernand, John A., General, 596. 64.3. 

McCook, A. McD., General, 594, 701. 

M'Clure, James, In Convention on the Articles of Con- 
federation, 356. 

M'Clitre, General. At Fort George, 427. 

M'Crea, Jane, 277. 

McCouN, General, 600. 

McCcxLOCK, Ben., General, 573. 

McDonald, Donald and Flor.v, 248. 

McDotjGALL, General, At Peekskill, 270. Secretary of 
the Continental Board of Admiralty, 30a 

McDowell, Charles. At King's Mountain, 319. 

McDowell, IrviN; 567,618. 

McPherson, Genenal, 643. 

M'Henry, James, 856, 384. 

Macomb, General, At Plattsbnrsh, notice of. 4.W. 

Macdonough, Commodore, Notice of, 434. 4:?.\ 

Madison, James, 856. One of the authors of the /V<Aer- 
alist, 361. His view of the Revenues of the United 
States, 367. Secretary of State. 890. President of Uk» 
United States, 404. 415. Notice of 405 

Mag.\^w, Colonel, At Fort Washington, 258. 

Magoffin, Governor, encourages secession, 575. 

Magkuder, Colonel, 502. 

Maine, Discovered, 58. Indian tribes of, 127. Settle- 
ment of, 80, 122. A part of Massachusetts until 1820, . 
129. A State, 452. Boundary of, 452. 

Maise, The first th.at was found by Miles Standish, 115l 

Malvern Hills. Battle ot; 622. 

Manchester, Burnt, 427. 

Manhattan Indians, 21. 

Manhattan Island, Sold to the Dutch bv the Manhattan 
Indians, 21. Purchased by Mintiit, 1.39. Origin of tho • 
name, 48. The fort at the" southern extremity o^ 72. 

M.VNLY, Captain. 808. 

Manahoaa Indians, 17. 

Manassas, Evacuated by the Rebels, 612. 

Manning, John, The trail or, 147. 

Mansfield, Battle near, 684. 

Mansfield, Lord, His decision respecting slavery, 53S_ 

Mansfield, Captain. 481. 

Manson, M. D., General, 633. 

M.tNTEO, Indian Chief, Lord of Roanoke, .55. 5fi. 

Manufactures. American, 177, 178, 216, ■147, 45S. 

Mariana. Territory of, 79. 

Marine Committee of Congress, 308. 

Marion, General, 204. In South Carolin.a, 314. Exploit*- 
of, 317, 818, 319, 320, 3:?S. Refuses to drink wine. .317. 
His first appearance at Gates's aiiup, 31S. Anecdot<? 
of him and a British officer at Charleston, 820. His 
camp destroyed, 820 ; his brigade defeatid, in his ab- 
sence, 345. 

Markham, Wn,LiAM, ^&. 161, 162, 10.3. 

Marlborough, Massachiisetts, Burnt, 127. 

Marriage Contra-cts. Restraints on, by Andros, 13^. 

Marsh, Ctdonel, Expedition .against Port Royal, 135. 

Marshali.. John, Envoy to France, 885. Announces the- 
death of W;whington" 386. Administers the oath of 
office to President Monroe, 446; Adams, 454, 46L No- 
tice of, 851. 

Martha's Vineyard, Discovere<l, 57, 58. Christian In- 
dians at, 1-2.3. 

Martin, Alexander, In the Convention on the Articles- 
of Confedei .ation, 356. 

Marti.v, Li-THER. In the Convention on the Articles oC 
Confederation, a')6. 

" Mary Johnson," the assumed name of Arthur Lee, 
266. 

Maryland, settlement of, 80-82. Origin of the name oC 
81. The first settlement in, 62. Tlie Seneca Indi- 
ans make war upon the colonists, 82, 110. Declaration 
of Rights, in 16;J9, 151. Civil war in. Toleration Act; 
an asylum for persecuted Churchmen and Puritans, 
151. Colonial government of; •ivil war in, 152. 
History of. 151. 

Mason, Grorgf, in the Convention on the Articles of 
Confederation, 356. 



Ttliy 



INDEX 



Mason, John, merchant and naval commander, 79. 
GoTernor of Portsmoutli, England, 80. Controversy 
<if ibe heirs of, 129. 
"MxBO-s, John, Captain, exterminates the Pequods, 87, 88. 
aviASON, Jamks m., author of the Fugitive Slave Law, 
.521. Confederate Commissioner, 587. Goes to 

^England, 5S9. 
^lassadvttseMs Indiana, 22. 

JJa«sacfiii«M&, settlement of, 62. History of, 114. 
Colony; charter, 117. Character of the colony, 119 ; 
rapid srrowth of the colony, creates alarm in England, 
120. Fortifications in, 121. Joins the confederacy of 
■colonists, 121. Government of; commerce of, with 
:the West Indies, 122. Growth of the colony, 129. 
(Controversy of, with the heirs of Gorges and Mason, 
329. A royal province, Wi. Cost of settling, 209. 
Early legislation of, 17.5. Grant from Parliament to, 
20(). Assembly's view of taxation, 219. A flotilla 
fitted out by, in 299. Board of Admiralty of, 307. Re- 
bellion in, 35.5. 
JMassasoit, chief of the Wampanoags, 90. Sachem, 114, 

115. His sons, 21, 124. 
.'Mather, Cotton, 133. Notice of, 134. 
■'MAtOTHEwa, Samuel, Governor of Virginia, 109. 
-■^SIatthkws, General (British), 297, 320. 
Mauritius, the. Origin of the name, 71. 
: Maverkk, Richard, 123. 

aiAWHOOD, Lieutenant-Colonel, at Princeton, 268. 
"MAXiMrLiAN, Empervir of Mexico, deatfi of, 728. 
May. CoKNELitis Jacobsen, First Director of New 

Netherland, 73. 
Mat, Captain, Captures General La Vega, 482. 

•^'- May-Flinter" Puritan vessel, 77. 
Mkade, Gbokoe G., General, 621, 622. Takes command 

of the army, 65-3, 659, 6S1, 692. 
MecMenJmry Z>ec;ar(/iif«i of Independence, 237. 
Medal. Presented by Congress to Washington, after 
the battle of Germantown, 275; to General Wayne, 
•288; to the captors of Andre 827. Struck by Louis, 
XIV., after the repulse of Phipps, 131. 
■ Jtedford, Massachusetts, Burned, 127. 
r?VlEDici, Lorenzo de, Vespucius's letter to, 41. 
.^Me«Ung House, First, at Hartford, Connecticut, 86. 
.Meherrin Indiana, 23. 
M£nG8, Colonel. 271. 
■~" Metampus." ship, 401. 
■Mblbndkz. Pedro, Governor of Florida, 50, 51. 
- Memorial to Parliament, Livingston's, 215. 
Memphis, 683. 
Mendoza. Cardinal, 33, 45. 
Menomonee Indians, 17, 19. 

Mercer, Hugh, General, 192. 259. Notice of, 269. 
Mercer, John Francis. 356. 
Meredith, William M., Secretary of the Treasury, 

499. 
Mktacomkt: .see King Philip. 
^{etamoras. General Ampudia at, 481. 
-IBTewtco, Origin of the name, 593. Civilization and the 
-arts in, 43. Burr's proposed invasion of, 396. War 
■witfe,4S0. The City of. 494. Treaty of Peace, 497. 
2Miarm. Indians, 17, 24, 2.5. Treaty with the, 408. Their 
teii-itory, 19. Conspire against the English, 1763, 
205. 
■MiANT0N0MOH,VanT.gan8et Sachem, 21, 87, 91.. 125. 
^IiCANOPY, Head Sachem of the Seminoles, 466. 
MicUgan, Peninsula, Indians on the, 18. Territory, 

89)6. State of, admitted to the Union, 469. 
.MieJiilgan Indians, 19. 
Miemac Indians, 22. 
.MiddU Plantations, The, 111. 

MiKFLiN, Thomas, General, 254, 257, 268, 356. His ad- 
dress to Washington, notice of, .352. 
MiLBORNK, Deputy Governor, 1-34, 148. E.xecuted, 148, 
MiLLEE, Colonel, Defeats Tecnm(ba,near Brownstown, 

411. At the battle of Lundy's Lane, 433. 
Mill Spring, Victory at, 594. 
.Min« River, Abatis on, 660. 
Jfin«iaree Indians, 31, 32. 

IMingo Indians. 23. Logan, the Mingo Chief, 20. 
3[inq%M Indians : see Mohawk Indians. 
■Mi.NON, General, Driven from Santillo, 485. 
'Minai Iridians, Their territory, 21. 
Mint,Onhe: United States, 372. 373. 
■MiNiHT, Petek, Governor, 8.5, 9-3, 139. 
-MmcUama, The, at Phihidelphia, 2s5. 
Mishav^an, The foundation of Charleston laid at, 117. 
-Mississagues Indians, 17, 205. 
.JUiMsissippi, Territory, 33S. State admitted to the Un- 



ion, 448. Session o£ 547. In possession of the Union, 
605. 
Mississippi River, Events beyond, 684. Valley of; 591. 

War in. 565. 
Missouri Indians, 32. 

Missouri, \\. State, 448, 452, 576. Raid into, 677. Lost 
to Confederates, 598. 

Missouri Compromise^'' The, 452. Repeal of, 526. 
Mitcuel, Ormbsy M., 606. 
Mitchell, Colonel, 432. 
Mobile, The British repulsed at, 438, 708. Fleet at, 709. 

Surrender of, 716. 
Mobilian Indians, 29, 31. 

Mohawk Indians, 21, 23. Active enemies of the Ameri- 
cans, 26. Hi-a-wat-ha's address to the, 24 Refuse to 
join King Philip, 127. At New Amsterdam, 141. 
Claim sovereign tv over the Riverlndians, 141. Allies 
of Colonel Williams, 190. Join St. Leger, 278. 
Mohawk Valley, Devastation of the, 290. 
Mohegan Indians, 17, 21, 85, 86. 
Molinos del Rey, Battle, 494. 
Monckton, Colonel, 1S5, 201. Grave of, 288. 
Money, Continental, 245. The first coined in the United 

States, 122. 
Monitor and Merrimack, Combat between, 614. 
Monk, General, 98. 

Monmouth, New Jersey, Battle of, 287. 
Monecan Indians, 17. 

Monroe, James, His treaty with Great Britain, 401. 
President of the United States, 446. Re-elected Presi- 
dent, 453. "Monroe docrtvine," 448. Notice of, 446. 
Monroe, Colonel, At Fort William, Henry, 194. 
Monroe, Major, At Point Isabel, 481. 
3fontagues Indians, 17. 
Montauk Indians. 21. 
" Montauk,^' Monitor, 672. 

Montcalm, Marquis de. 192, 194. Notice of, 120, 202. 
Montgomery, Ala, Surrender of, 715. 
Monterey, Battle of, 484. 

Montezuma, in. His deputation to Cortez, 48. 
Montgomery, John, Governor, 150. 
Montgomery, Colonel (British). lu the Cherokee coun- 
try, 204. 
Montgomery, Richard, General, 238, 241. Assaults 

Quebec, 242. Notice of, 240. 
Montgomery, Commodore, Takes possession of San 

Francisco, 487. 
Montreal, Origin of the name, 48. Surrender of, in 

203. 
Moosas, General, 435. 

Moore, James, Governor of South Carolina, 168, 170. 
Moore, Colonel, 168. 
Moravians and La Fayette, after his being wounded at 

Brandywine, 274. 
Morgan, John H., Guerrilla Chief, 632. 658, 661, 688. 
Morgan, Daniel, General, at Quebec, 242. At Saratoga 

282. At theCowpens831. Notice of, 331. 
Morgan William, 457. 
Morgan Colonel, At Agua Frio, 486. 
Morocco, War of the United States with, 1801, 390. 
Mormons, The, 499, 504. Their movements, 537, 749. 
Morris, Gouverneur, 185, 856. His remarks on Coins 
and Currency, 372. His part in the Erie Canal, 457. 
Notice of, 364. 
ilorris Island, 673. 
Morris, Lewis, First Royal Governor of New Jersey, 

161. 
Morris Robert, Supplies Washington with money, at 
Trenton, 263. Agent of Marine; his privateers, 308. 
His National Bank, 829. At the Convention, on the 
Articles of Confederation, 356. His views of harmonis- 
ing the money of the United States, 372. Notice of, 
264. 
Morris, Rooek, Notice of, 259. 
Morris, Commodore, His exploit on the Penobscot 

River, 438. 
Morris, Major. Death of, 269. 

Morristoum, New Jersey. Washington's winter quar- 
ters at, 269, 306. Sufferings of the American trooi)S at, 
306. 
Morse, S. F. B., Sketch of, 507, 508. 
Motte, Rebecca, Notice of, .335, 3:36. 
Moultrie, General, 204. 295. Notice of, 249. 
Mount Hope Bay, A Scandinavian child born on tho 

shore of, .So. 
Mount Independence, 276. 
Mount Vernon, Leonard Calvert at, 82. 
Mum/ordsville, Battle at, 633. 



INDEX. 



xir 



Murfree9boro\ Battle at, 638, 706. 
MaBRAT, General, 201, 20a 
Murray, W. V.. Envoy to France, S 
Muskogee Indians, 29. 



Kahant, 57. Captain Block at, 72 

Jfnnsemond River, Settlement on the, 97. 

Nantes, The Edict of, 166. 

Nitnticoke Indians, Allies of the Five Nations, 17, 20. 

Nantucket, Discovery of, 57. Christian Indians at, 123. 

Napoleon: see Bonaparte. 

Narragamet IndianK. 21, 22, 86. Propose to exter- 
minate the white people, 87. Treaty of Peace with 
the, 125. Join King Philip, 127. 

Narraqanset Bay, Penetrated by Captain Block, 72. 

Narvabz, Pamphilo, Governor of Florida, 43, 44. 

Nash, Governor, 330. 

Nashville, Tenn., Evacuation of, 599. Threatened, 632, 
705. 



Natchez Indians, 29, 30. Population of, : 
of the, 12. 



Language 
Currency, 



National, Bank of the United States, 372, 
372. Debt, 739, 74.3. 

Naumkeiig Colony. 117. 

*• NatUilu>i^' briar, 414. 

N'avajo IndiatisASS. 

Naval Stores, Imported from America into Great Bri- 
tain, 206. 

Naval Engagement m Charleston Harbor, 672. 

Navigation Act, The, 109, 123, 177. 

Navy, American, Origin of the. 245, 246, 382. Rank of 
Commanders, 308. State of, 407, 414, 445. 

Ironcliids, 595. Ships of, 686. 

Navy, British, 206. 445. 

Neal, Captain, Death of. 269. 

Nebraska, Territory of, 518. Opened to Slavery, 526. 

Negro Plot, in New York, 150. 

Negro Slaves : see Slaves. 

Negro Troops, Medal for, 596. 

Nrilson, .loiiN, 356. 

Neosho Indians, 24 

Neutral Indians, 23. 

Nevada, Becomes a State, 765. 

New Amsterdam, Meeting of Dutch deputies at, in 143. 

New Berne, N. C, Battle at 606. Seige abandoned, 705. 

New Brunswick, Origin of the name^of, 58. Boundary 
of, 472. 

Nfwburg Addresses, 349. 

Newcastle. Delaware, 93, 143. William Penn at, 96. 

New England Indians, 17, 22. Invaded by the Five 
Nations, 24. 

New England, Scandinavians visit the coast of, 34. Ex- 
plored by Captain John Smith. Origin of the name, 
74. Proposed union of the colonies of, in 121. Popu- 
l.ition of, in 1675, 126. Effects of King Philip's War in 
129. 

New Era Gunboat, 682. 

Newfoundland, Portuguese settlement in, 47. Seen 
by Cabot, 46. Cod-flshery at, discovered by Cabot, 47. 
Visits to, by early navigators, 52. 

New France, The name given by Verazzani to the re- 
gions discovered by him, 48. 

N'ew Hampshire, Origin of the name, SO. Settlement 
of, 62, 122 A rovafprovince, 80, 129. Grant to, 206. 

New Haven Colony, 121, 127, 154. 

N^ew Jersey, Origin of the name, 159. Wampum manu- 
factured in, 13. Swedes in, 62. Founded, 93, 159. 
Sale of, by the Duke of York, 144. The Dutch take 
possession of, 147. Discontents in 159. Invaded by 
Matthews, 320. History of the colony of, 159. 

New London. Burnt by Arnold, 340. 

NHw Madrid, Evacuated by the Confederates, 600. 

New Mexico, A Territory of the United States, 497, 501. 
Claims of Texas to portions of, 499. Petition of, for a 
civil government, 499. 

Neio Netherland, 72, 73. Founded 139. Given by 
Charles II. to the Duke of York, 113, 144. 

New Orleans, Ceded to Spain, 204. Battle of, 439. 
Naval battle at, 610. Fearful panic in, 611. 

Newport, Christopher, Captain, 6.5, 68. 

Newport, Khode Island, 48. Ternay's fleet at, 321. 
Tower at: see Tower. 

New Rochelle, Mrs. Hutcheson takes refuge at, 120. 

Newspapers, In the American colonies ; m the United 
States, 179. 



New Sweden, 93, 143. 

New Winsd<\ , Washington head-quarters at, 828. 

New York City, Dutch settlement at, 62. Origin of, 72, 

144. Expedition from, to Canada, 131. Colony at, 1.39. 

The Dutch taken possession of, 147. Evacuated, 85<J. 

Great Are at, 471. Crystal Palace in, 516. Kiot in, 

657. 
New York, History of the Colony of, 139. Grants from 

Parliament to, 206. General Knyphausen at, 809. 
New York Bay, 48, 57. 
Nezperce Indians, 33. 

Niagara Falls, Battle at, 48.3. Village at, burnt, 427. 
Niagara Frontier, Shirley's expedition to the, 185, 189 
'^Niagara" ship, 425. 
NianUc Indians, 87. 
Nicaragua, State of, 522. 
Nicholson, Francis, Governor, 148, 171. 
Nicholson, Colonel, 136. 

Nicola, Colonel. His letter to Washington, 849. 
Nicolas, Father, Removes the Church-bell from Deer- 
field, 13.5. 
Nicolls, Richard, Colonel, 123, 144 
Ninety-six, Origin of the name, 835. Siege o£ b* 

Greene, 336. 
Niniobet, 21. At New Amsterdam, 141, 142, 154, 155. 
Nijimuc Indians, 22, 125. 
Norfolk. Virginia, 244, 297. 
North Carolina, Secession o^ 547. Events in, 704. 

Sherman's march through, 712. 
North, Lord, His Conciliatory Bills, 286. The news of 

the capture of Cornwallis, S45. Retires from office, 

345. Notice of, 224. 
North-Enstern Boxmdary Question, 476. 
North Carolina, 98. Colony, 167. Opposed taxation, 

223 Joins the Uniou. 171. 
North Castle. The American camp at, 259. 
Northp'eld. Connecacut, 126. 
Northi/tan, 34,35. 
North i'oint. Buttle of, 437. 
North Virgin a, 63. 
North West Territory, 363. 
Norridgewock Indians, 22. ■ 
Nottoioay Indians, 23. 
Nova Scotia, 58, 132, 13a Origin of, 80. Portngnesa 

settlement in, 47. 
Nova Ccesarea, 93. 
Nueces, The, General Taylor at, 481. 
Nullifiers of South Carolina, 463. 
Number Ten Island, 599. Capture of; 604. 



0. 



Oconee River, 28. 
Oaracock Inlet, 54. 
Ogdenshurg, Capture of, 425. 
River, 28. 



Ogilvie, Captain, at Qucenstown, 418. 

Oglethorpe, James Edward, General. His voyage tn 
America, 100. Founds Savannah, 62, 100. His first 
interview with the Indians at Savannah, 30. His 
colony, 171. Meets Chiefs in Council, 103. His con- 
test with the Spaniards, 172. Notice of. 99. 

O'Haea, General, At the siege of Yorktown, 342. 

Ohio Company, The, Organized, 36:3. George II.'s 
grant to, 181. 

Ojeda, Accompanies Vespucius, 41, 60. 

Old Dominion, The, Origin of the name, 109. 

Omaha Indians, 32. 

Oneida Indians, 23. Favor the Americans, in the 
Revolution, 26. Hi-a-wat-ha's address to the, 34. 

Opecuancanocgh, 66. Captures Captain John Smith, 
106. Hostile to the Virginia Colony, 108. 

Ord, General, 635. 

Orders in Council. 400, 402. 

Oregon Indians, 83. 

Oregon Territory. 33. British claims to, 479. Settle- 
ment of the boundarv question, 497. 

Orphan House, Whitfield's, 171, 172. 

Osage Indians, 32. 

Osceola, 466, 468. 

Ostend Circular, 520. 

Oswald, Richard, English Commissioner on the Treaty 
of Peace, 348. 

Oswego, 192. Battle at. in 1814, 482, 485. 

Otis, James, 207. 208, 212, 213, 219. Notice of, 212. 

Otoe Indians, 32. 

Ottawa Indians, 17. Attempt to extermiMt* tb« 



zIyi 



I N D K X. 



■white people in 1763, 18, 20=. Aid the French against 
the Sacs and Foxes, IS. Their war with the Five 
Nations, 18, 2o. 

Outagamie Indians. See Fox Indians. 

Oyster Point, South Carolina, 99, 166. 

Oyst&r liiver, incursiou of French and Indians at, 134. 



P. 



Packenham. General, at New Orleans, 439, 440. 

Padncah, 6S2. 

Paine, Thomas, his " Common Sense," 250. 

Palo Alto, battle of, 482. 

Palo/i, Columbus sails from, 34, 39, 40. 

Pamunkey Indians, 111. 

Panama, Commissioners at, 457. liailroad in, 522. 

Pan/aco River, the followers of De Sota at the, 45. 

Paper Blockades, 444. 

Paper Money, issued by Massachusetts, 122, 132. 

PAPINEA0. Lotris Joseph, 472. 

Parbdes, General, succeeds Herrera, 481. 

Paris, treaty of peace at, 204, 848. The allied armies 
enter, 431. 

Parker, Sir Peter, 24S, 261. 

Parliament, its Act of Supremacy, 75. Its appropria- 
tion to Georgia, 100. Grants by, during the Seven 
Years' War in America, 206. 

Passamaquoddy Indians, 22. 

Paterson, William, 356, 359. 

Patroo7ia, Account of the, 139. 

Paulding, John, 326. 

Paulus's Hook, 94. 

Paow, Michael, 94, 139. 

Pavonia, territory of, 94. 

Pawnee Indians, 33. 

Pawtucket Indians, 22. 

Payne, General, 416. 

"^ Peace- Makers" in Pennsylvania, 162. 

Peace-Party, of 1812, 410. 

Peace, Treaty of, Guadalupe Hidalgo, 497. 

Pea Ridge, battle of, 592, 635. 

'• Peacock;' brig, 429, 440. 

Pkaece, Colonel, at Yorl;, Canada, 425. 

Pearl liiver, 29. 

Peers of England, cannot be arrested for debt, 150. 

Pbiece, E. W., General, 502. 

" Pelican" sloop of war, 430. 

Pembkrton, John C, 642. 

Pemaquid Point, 80, 131. Capture of the garrison at, 
130, 134. 

Pensacola, abandoned by the Confederates, 609. 

Pendleton. Nathaniel, 356. 

'• Penguin," brig, 440. 

Pknn, WiLLiAM,"his charter from Charles II.; purchases 
part of New Jersey, 05. His voyage to America, his 
government, 96. His advice to the Dulie of York, 
respecting an assembly of Kepresentatives, 147. His 
purchases of parts of New Jersey, 160. His arrival in 
Pennsylvania; his treaty with the Delawai-e Indians, 

161. His Charter of Liberties ; his return to England, 

162. Deprived of his provisional government; his 
rights restored in ; returns to England, 163. Philadel- 
phia founded by, 162. Suggests a Union of the Colo- 
nies, 183. Involved in debt, 209. His sons, 163. No- 
tice of, 95. 

Pennacook Indians, 22. 

Pennsylvania, origin of the name, 96. Swedes in, 62. 

Histoiy of the Colony of, 161. Mutiny of the troops 

of, 328. ^ 

Penobscot Indians, 22. 

Pensacola, Florida, stormed, 438. Captured, 451. 
Peoria Intlians, 19. 
Peppeuell, William, 137. 
Petiuod Indians, 21, 86, 87. 

Percy, George, Acting-Governor of Virginia, 68, 69 
Perry, Cotnmodore, e.xpedition to Japan, 500. 
Perryville, battle near, 634. 
Perry, Oliver H., Commodore , Hisexph>its, 423, 430. 

His expedition against pirates, 453. Notice of, 423. 
Perry, M. C, Commodore, captures Tampico, Tabasco, 

and TusfHin, 485. 
Petersburg, attack on, 691. Seige of, 69-3, 717. 
Perth Amb<>f/,^e-w Jersey, oriirin of the name, 160. 
Peters, H ugh, 86, 119." 

Peters, Uiciiaed, Secretary of the Board of War, 294. 
Petrels, seen by Columbus and his crew, 39. 



Philadelphia, founded, 162. 

'•Philadelphia," the, 391. Decatur's exploit in firine 

the, 392. 
Philip 11., of Spain, his measures against the French 

Protestants in America, 50. 
Philip, King; see King Philip; notice of, 124 
Phillips, Genera!, joins Arnold ; death of, 330. 
Phillipse, Mart, Miss, 259. 
Phipps, Sir William, his expedition against the French, 

131. At Quebec, 131. Sent to England, 132. 
''Phoebe," frigate, 431. 
Piankeshaio Indianx, 17, 19. 
Pickens, General, 295, 314, 315, 319. At Ninety-six, 330. 

Notice of, 337. 
Pickering, John, member of the Convention on the 

Articles of Confederation, 356. 
Picture Writiiig, Indian, 13. 

Pierce, Franklin, in the army in Mexico, 493. Inau- 
gurated President, 512. Notice of, 513. 
Pierce, William, in the Convention on the Articles of 

Confederation. 856. 
PiGOT, General, 289, 335. 
Pike, Albert, notice of, 592. 
Pike, Zebulon M., notice of, 425. 
"Pilgrims;'' The; voyage of to America, 77, 78. Names 

of; fabulous story of, 78. Salutation of, by Samosel, 

114. 
Pillow, Gideon J., 566, 596. 
Pilot Knob, 687. 
PiNCKiVEir, Charles, in the Convention on the Articles 

of Confederation, 1787, 356. 
PiNCKNET, Charles Cotesworth, in the Convention on 

the Articles of Confederation, 356. Envoy to France, 

1797, 385. Candidate for the Presidency, 388, 396, 404. 

Notice of, 385. 
Pine Tree Money, 122. 
PiNKNEY, William, His Treaty with Great Britain, 400. 

Notice of, 401. 
Pipe of Peace. Indi.an, 14. 
PiHcataqua, Letters from the King's commissioner at, 

118. 
Piracy, The Earl of Bellemont's efforts to suppress, 

149. In the West Indies, 149. 
Pitcairn, Major, 232. 
Pitt William, 195. His views of taxation, 217, 544. 

His scheme for conquering Canada, 199. Resigns his 

office as Prime Minister, 213. Notice of, 217. See 

Chatham. 
Pitt William, the younger, 367. 
Plains of Abraham, 201, 202, 241. 
Planetarium, Eittenhouse's, 210, 269. 
Plattsburg Bay, Naval action in, 435. 
Pleasant Hill, Battle near, 6S5. 
Plymouth Colony, Its Government, 116. Joins the 

Confederacy of Colonies, 121. 
Plymouth Company, 63, 64. Explore North Virginia, 

73. Employ Captain John Smith, new charter of the, 

1620; superseded by the Council of Plymouth, 74. 

Consent to the establishment of a Puritan Colony in 

North Virginia, 77. 
Plymouth, Council of, 74. 
Plymouth Rock, 79. 
Pocahontas, Tlie story of, 66. Guardian angel of the 

Virginia colony, 69. Captmed by Captain Argall; 

baptized: marries John Rolfe, 70. John Randolph, 

decended from, 404. Portrait oi, 66. 
" Poietiers," ship 415. 
Point Comfort, 64. 
Point Isabel, 481. 

Point Pleasant, The Shawnoese Indians subdued at, 19.^ 
Pokonet India/is, 22. 
Polk James K., President of the United States, 478. 

Proclaims Peace with Mexico, 497. Notice of, 478, 

479. 

Polk, Leonidas, (General, 566, 577. 081 

PoMEKoY, Seth, General, 19S, 23S. 

Pompton, New Jersey troops at, .328, 329. 

Ponce de Leon. .lu.m'. I )is<-overs Florida, 42, 43. 

PoNTiAC, Ottawa Clii.-f. In 204,205. 

Pope, The, His Apostolic Vicar in the United States, 
:35;3. Bulls of. 46. 

Pope. John. General,, 591. 600, 623, 624. 

PoPHAM, George, Member of the Plymouth Com- 
pany. 63. 

PopiiAM, Sir John, At Kennebec, 73. Death of, 74. 

Popular Rights, in Virgina, 112, 113. 

Population^ Of the American colonies, 179. Increase 



IXDEX. 



Xh 



of, in the United SUtes, 447, 44S. Of Indian Tribes 

81, 32. 
" Porcupine" schooner, 420. 
PoEEY, Secretary of Virginia, 97. 
Porter, David, Commodore, 430. His Expedition 

asainst pirates, 45:3. Notice of, 431, 609, 642. 
Porter, Fitz John, 619, 620. 
Port Hudson, 635, Surrender of, 646. 
I'ort Royal, Nova Scotia. Founded, 58. Seized by 

Phipps, 131. Expedition against, 135, 1.36. 
Port Royal, South Carolina, Oglethorpe at, 100. Lord 

CardoD settles at ; claimed by the Spaniards, 166. 
Poi-tsmoiith, New Hampshire, Founded, 80. 
Portugal, Claims of, against the United States, 468. 
Portuguese, Settle in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, 

Porto Rico, Exploring voyages to, 41. Ponce de Leon 

Governor of; his return to," 42. 
Post Ojfio6,o{the United States, 373. 507. 
Potomac, Army of The ; losses in, 679, 571, 647, 623. 
Potomac River, blockade of, 584. 
Potter, Colonel, Death of, 269. 
Pottowatomie Indians, 17, 18. Conspire against the 

English, 205. 
Potts, Isaac, and General Washington, 235. 
PouTRiNoouRT, M. At Port Royal, Nova Scotia, 58. 
PowHATTAN, 65. His history, 20. His eldest brother, 
66. His daughter, Pocahontas, 20, 66. His hostility, 
and friendship, 70. Death of, 106. 
Po7vhatan Indians, 17, 20, 107, 108. 
Powhatan River, 64. 

Prayer, in the Continental Congress, 228. In the Con- 
vention on the Articles of Confederation, .859. Mac- 
donough'8,435. 
Preble Jedediah, General, 2.30. 
Preble, Commodore, In the Mediterranean, 891. 
Prescott, General (British), Captured; exchanged for 

General Charles Lee, 261, 271. 
Prescott, William, Colonel, 234, 235, 236. Notice of, 

234. 
" President" frigate, 407, 414, 440. 
Press, Freedom of the, restrained by Andros, 130. 
Preston, Captain, 221, 222. 

Provost, Augustine, General. In East Florida, in 
294. At Brier Creek, 295. Prepares to invade South 
Carolina, 296. 
Prevost, Sir George, General, Succeeds General Bjock, 

416. At Sacketfs Harbor, 426. At Plattsburg, 434. 
Price, Colonel, In New Me.xico, 489. 
Price, Sterling, General, 566, 591, 676. 
Peideaux, General, 199, 200. 

Prince of Orange, The, Friendly to America, 266. 
Princeton, New Jersey, Captured bj» Coruwalls, 260. 

Battle of, 269. 
" Princeton," steamer, 475. 

Prino, Maktin, His Expedition to America, 53, 73. 
Printing, Effects produced by the art of, 62. Forbid- 
den in New York, by James II., 147. In the Ameri- 
can colonies, prohibited by William III., 15.3. 
Printing Press, The i'irst established in Virginia: 114. 
Prison Ship, Jersey, 259. 
Privateering, 149. ' Account of, 246. Privateers iitted 

out by Robert Morris, 308; and by M. Genet, 337. 
Private Judgment, Doctrine of, at Plvmouth, 116. 
Proctor, General, 416. At Fort Meigs;418, 419? Routed, 

424. 
'• Prophet," The, 408. 

Protestafit, Origin of the word, 62. Reformation, 62. 
Feeling aroused in England, by the cruelties of Me- 
lendez, 52. French Protestants in Carolina, 55. Prot- 
estantism in England, 75. 
Providence Plantation, 91. 
Providence, Rhode Island. Founded, 90. Burned, 

127. 
Public Lands of the United States, 372. 
Puebla, The Citv of, Captured by General Scott, 490. 
PiTLASKi, Count, 274. Notice of, 305. 
Pulaski Fort, taking of, 608. 
Pulpit Rock, Lookout mountain, 669. 
Puncah Indians, 32. 

Puritans, 75, 76. Friendly intercourse of the, with the 
Dutch, 85. Of Massachusetts colony, 118. Settle in 
New Netherland, 143. 
PCTNA.M, IsRAE^ General, 194, 2.34, 23.5, 238. In the 
French and Indian War, 198. Enters Boston, 247. On 
Long Island, 2.53. At the house of Roger Morris, 259. 
His exploit at Greenwich. 297. Notice of, 253. 
Putnam, Rcfus, General, Notice of, 863. 



Putnam, H. P., Colonel, 674. 

Pyle, Colonel, Defeated by Colonel Henry Lcc, 833. 



Quahoag, Englishmen slain at, 126. 

Quakers, Origin of the name, 94. Their tenets, 1-^4 
In I ennsylvania, 94. In Massachusetts Bay, 122 In 
North Carolina, 168, 231. In New Jersey, 160. Com- 
pelled to pay fines, 110. Persecuted, 94, 122, 123. 

Quaker Hill, Battle of, 290. 

Quebec, Algonquins at, 17. Founders of 74. Military 
operations at, 201. Surrender of, to General Murray, 

" Quebec Act." The, 225. 

Queen Anne, of England, 134. Queen Anne's War, 135 

Queenstoion, Battle of, 413. 414. 

Quincy, Josiah, Defends Captain Preston, 222. 

Quimpiac Creek, 88. 

Quitman, General, 483, 494. Notice of, 494. 

Quon-eh-ta-cut, or Connecticut, 85. 



K. 



Raisin River, 417. 

Raleigh, Sir Walter. Studies the art of war, under 

Coligny, 52. Introduces tobacco into Ensland, 70. 

Historical error respecting. 100. Notice of, 55, 56. 
Raleigh Tavern, The, 226. 

Rall, Colonel, With his Hessians at Trenton, 262 
Ramsay, David, Notice of, 312, 617. 
Randolph, Edward, 129. 
Randolph, Edmund, 356, 359. Attorney General of 

the United States, 369. 
Randolph, John, Notice of, 403, 404. 
Randolph, Peyton, 228. 
Rank, Of American Naval ami Military commanders, 

808. ^ 

RAPEL.IK, Sarah, 78. 
Rappahannock Station, battle of, 659. 
Rappahannock River, explored by Captain John Smith, 

67. 
Raritan Indians, 140. 

Ratcliffe, President of the Plymouth Colony, 65. 
R AWDON, Lord, on the Santee River ; at Sanders's Creek, 

815. At Hobkirk's Hill, 334.- Embarks for England,. 

Read, George, 856. 

Rebellion, preparations for, 550. 

Red Cross of St. George, 144. 

Red River, campaign of, 644. Expedition to, 684. 

Red River. De Soto's followers wander among tributary 
streams of the, 4.5. 

Reformation, the Protestant, 62. Effects of in Fran'« 
49. 

" Regulators," the, 223. 

Rehoboth, Rhode Island, founded, 89. 

Reno, General, killed, 628. 

Republican Party, the, 877. 

Republicanism in Maryland, 1.52. 

Representatives in Congress. 866. 

Resaca de la Palma, battle of, 482. 

'■'■Retaliation," schooner, captured, 885. 

Revenue of the United States, 383. 

Revere, Paul, 232. 

Revolution, Amirican, history of the, 207. The Shaw- 
noese aid the British in the, 19. The Lenni-Lenape» 
join the British, 21. Officers and soldiers of the. oro- 
vided for, 453. 

Revolution, Enslish, of 1688, 162. 

Rubtt, Colonel,''169. 

Rhode Island, explored by Scandinavians, 85. Origia 
of; 89, 91. Founded, 62, 119. Origin of the name, 91. 
Seal of, 91. Colony of, proposes to join the Confed- 
eracy of Colonies, 121. History of, 157. Charter of. 
158. Refuses to be included in Connecticut Colony, 
155. Relisious toleration in, 1.51. Persecution of 
Roman Catholics and Quakers in, 158. Sir Peter 
Parker at, 261. Evacuated by the British, 806. Join* 
the Union, 371. State Constitution of, 157, 447. 

RiALi., General, at Chippew.a, 48;?. 

Ribault. John, sails with Huguenots for America, 5<). 
Fate of and his party, .50, 51. 

Riee, oridn of the culture of, in South Carolina, 167. 

Richmond, McClellan turns back from, 621. EvenU tX, 



xlviii 



INDEX 



679. Beige of, 693. C.impaign against, 698. Evacua- 
tion of, 718. 

EiBDBSEL, Baron, -with Burgoyne, 281. 

KiLBY, General, Governor of California, 499. 

Jting, presented by Winthrop to Charles II., 155. 

EiNOQOLD, Major, 482. 

EiNGGOLD, Captain, his expedition, 415. 

Bio del Norte, Coronada's expedition to the head waters 
of the, 45. 

Rio Grande, 480, 481. Boundary of the Aztec Empire, 
10, 678. 

Ripley, General, at Fort Erie, in 1S14, 433. 

EisiNGii, Governor, 143. 

EiTTENHOusB, Davld, 210, 211. 

Miver Indiana, 140, 141. 

EoANOKE, Lord of, 56. 

Roanoke Island, 55, 64. Attack on, 90. 

EoBB, William, at the battle of King's Mountain, 819. 

KoBEETVAL, Lord, his expedition to New France; arrives 
at Newfoundland ; his second expedition, 1549, 49. 

EoBiNSON, John, Eev., at Leyden, 77. His remark 
respecting Standish's slaughter of Indians, 115, 116. 
His family join the Plymouth colonists, 116. 

EooHAMBEAtr, Count de, arrives at Newport, 821. His 
first interview with Washington, 323. At Dobbs's 
Ferry, 839. At Yorktown, 34f. Notice of, 839. 

EocHB, Marquis de Ka, 57. 

Rockets, used in war, described, 437. 

EocKiNGHAM, Marquis of, 217. 

EoDNEY, CiESAR, Attorney-General of the United States, 
406. 

RoLFE, John, marries Pocahontas, 70. 

EoGERS, C. E. P., Commodore, 407, 608. 

EoGEBS, Major, 194. His expedition against the St 
Francis Indians, 200. 

Roman Catholics, auricular confession of, 38. Punish 
■witchcraft, 182. Found a colony in Maryland, 62, 81, 
151,152. Persecuted by Puritans, 119; and in Mary- 
land, New York, and New England, 131, 132, 154. 
Provincial offices in New York filled by, 147. The 
prevalence of their faith in Lower Canada, 203. Par- 
liamentary concessions to, 225. 

RoqtJE, Francis de la, see Eobertval. 

Eosi;, Mr., British Envoy to the United States, 402. 

EoBECRANS, W. S., General, 563, 634, 637, 663, 665. 

RosB, General, 436. Death of, 437. 

Roxhv/ry, Massachusetts, founded, 1 18 

KouBSEAir, General, 706. 

Royal Standard of England, 144. 

RuQGLBS, Timothy, 190, 215. 

Rvm, Indians supplied with by the Dutch, 140. 

Rush, Benjamin, Dr., his letter to General Wayne, 298. 
Notice of, 250, 251, 

RuBSEL, John, United States Commissioner at Ghent, 
443. 

EtTSSELL, Lord John, 512. 

Vussia, England's first maritime connection with, 47. 
Vassalage in, 63. The Emperor of enters Paris, 431. 
Treaty of the United States with, 469. 

Rutherford, General, 295. 

EuTLEDGE, Edward, on the committee to confer with 
Lord Howe, 257. 

EuTLEDGB, John, in Convention on the Articles of Con- 
federation, 856, 359 Defends Charleston, 310. His 
proceedings after the capture of Lord Cornwallis, 345. 
Judge of the Supreme Court of the United States, 
369. Notice of, 310. 

Ryswick, the treaty at, 134. 



S. 

Sacs and Fovea, 17, 18. 

St. Augustine, Florida, Ponce de Leon lands near, 42. 
Eibault's expedition arrives at, 50. Founded, 51. 
Spanish military post at, 61. 609. 

St. Auffustine, Mexico, General Twiggs at, 493. 

St. Clair, General, 275. His expedition against the In- 
dians, 1791, 374. 

Si. Croix River, De Monts at the, 53. 

St. Domitigo, discovery of, by Columbus, 40. Exploring 
voyages to, 41. D'Ayllon dies at, 43. The body of 
Columbus removed to, 41, 

St. Francis Indians, Major Eogers's expedition against 
the, 200. 

St. John's, Newfoundland, Gilbert at, 52. 

■<S<. John's River, named by Eibault " Eiver of May," 50. 



St. Latorence River, origin of the name, 48. Indians on 

St. Leger, Colonel, in the Mohawk Valley, 278. Investa 
Fort Stanwix, 278. 

St. Mary's, Florida, pirates and slave-dealers at, 448. 

St. Mary's, Maryland, 151, Founded; legislative As- 
sembly convened at, 82. 

St. Piekee, M. db, Governor Dinwiddle's letter to, 181, 
1S2. 

St. Regis, Gener.al Wilkinson at, 427. 

Sdleni, Massachusetts, colony, 117. The General As- 
sembly of Massachusetts meets at, 226, 227. Witch- 
craft at, 132, 133. 

Salem, New Jersey, origin of the name, 95. 

Salmon Falls village attacked by the French and In- 
dians, 131. 

Saltillo, General Wool and Colonel Doniphan at, 484, 4SS. 

Saltonstall, Sir Richard, 117, 118. 

Samoset salutes the Pilgrim Fathers, 114. Teaches 
Standish how to cultivate Indian corn, 115. 

San Antonio, 483, 493. 

Sanitary Commission, 723. 

Sanders's Creek, battle at, 815. 

Sandys, Sir Edward, 77, 105. 

San Gabriel, battle at, 487. 

San Juan d' Ulloa, Castle of, 489. 

San Luis Potosi, 485. 

San Salvador, see G^ianahama. 

Santa Anna, Antonio Lopsz ee, 477, 485, 486, 489, 490. 
Sketch of, 514. 

^'■Saratoga." ship, 435. 

Sargent, Winthrop, 363. 

Sasco Swami), 88. 

Sassaous, Pequod Sachem, 21, 87, 88. 

Sassamon, John, 124. 

Saunders, Admiral, 201. 

Savaiinah Indians, 8(1. 

Savannah, Georgia, founded, 62, 101, 10.3. Siege of, 805. 
Evacuated by the British, 348, 703. 

Say-and-Seal, Lord, 85. 

Saybrook, Connecticut, settlement at, 86. Andros's ex- 
pedition to, 147. Colony at, 154. 

Sayle, William, his colony ; death of, 98. 

Sayre, Stephen, Chatham's letter to, 228. 

Scandinavian Voyages, 34. Child born at Ehode Is- 
land, 35. 

Schenectaday, Desolated, 181, 148. 

Schofield, J. M., General, 635, 705, 713. 

Schoharie Valley, Devastation of, 290. 

Schools, Established in Mass., 121. 

Schuyler, Philip, General, Conveys to Albany the re- 
mains of Lord Howe, 197. At He aux Noix, 240. At 
Fort Edward, 276. Superseded by Gates, 277. Notice 
of, 289, 240. 

"■Scorpion," The, One of Commodore Perry's vessels, 
420. 

ScoTT, Dred, Fugitive Slave, decision concerning, 582. 

Scott, Winfield, General, At Fort George, 426. Cap- 
tures Fort Erie, 433. His mission to remove the 
Cherokees; his expedition against the Seminoles, 467. 
On the Canada frontier, in Maine, 472. Plan of his 
Mexican campaign, 483. At Vera Cruz, 485, 489. At 
Cerro Gordo, 4S9, 490. At Cherubusco, 1847, 493. 
At Chepultepec, 494. At Mexico, 494, 495. Nomin- 
ated President of the United States, 513. Notice of, 
4S5, 507. 

Sbabury. Samuel, Bishop of Connecticut, 354. 

Sbarb, Isaac, 232. 

Seaver, Ebenezer, of Massachusetts, 409. 

Secession, Authors of, 540. 

Sedgwick, General, 650. Killed, 690. 

Sedgwick, Theodore, Address of, 516. 

Sedition Law of the United States, 3S6. 

Seekonk River, 89, 90. 

Se/minole Indians, Subdued by General Jackson, St 
Deputations of, 448, 466. Treaties of the, with the 
United States, 468. 

Semmes, Eaphael, Captain oi ^'' Alabama," 641, 707. 

Seneca Indians, 23, 110. Eed Jacket Chief of the 14. 
At Genesee Flats, 804. Conspire against the English. 
205. Hi-a-wat-ha's address to the, 24. 

" Serapis," ship Captured by Paul Jones, 807. 

Settlement, Era of, in North Ameriea, 61. 

Seven Years' War in America, 179. Cost of the, 204, 
206. 

Seven Pines, Battle of, 619. 

Sevier, John, At King's Mountain, 819. 

Sewakd, William U., 588. 



INDEX. 



xllx 



■Shackamaron . T'eiin-ylvania, 96. 
•■'Shades of Death." The, 291. 

SUAFTESBUKY. Kurl, of, 98, 99. His "Fundamental Con- 
stitutions, " 164. 
^'Shannon,'" fiiirale. 429. 
Shari'e, Governor, 184, 185. 
8uAW, KoBERT G. Jr., Colonel, CT4. 
SItaicmut. Massachusetts, 89, 118. The site of Boston 
visited by Standish, 115. ' 

Shawnoese Indians, 17, 19. Join the French, ip the 
French and Indian War, 19. Aid the British, 19. Con- 
sjiire against the English, 205. Treaty with the, 863. 
Shays, Daniel, 353. 

Sheaffe, General. 416. At York, Canada, 425. 
SuELBT, Isaac, Governcn-, At King's Mountain, 319. 
S.-inctions Hopldn's Kxpedition against the Indians^ 
416. Declines the appointment of Secretary of War. 
44T. Notices of, 417,420. 
Shelly, Gloucester County, Virginia. 66. 
iShenundoah Valley, 689. (Campaign in. 697, 652. 
Sheridan Philip H., General, 690, 692, 697. 
Suer.man Uoger. On the Committee to draft the Declar- 
ation of Independence, 251. In Convention on the 
Articles of Confederation, 356. 
Sherman, T. W., General, 582. 
Sherman, W. T., General, 599, 609, 642, 669, 6S1, 099, 701. 

His march to the sea, 703, 705, 712. 
Shields, General, In Mexico, 493. Notice of, 493. 
Shiloh, Battle of. 602. 

Ships, Ealeigh's 65. The class of, used by the eariy ex- 
plorers of America, 60. 
SuiPPEN, Edward, General Arnold marries tlie daiisrhtor 

of, 324. 
SuippEN, Captain, Death of, 209. 

Shirley, William. Governor, 187, 184, 185. His Ex- 
pedition against Niagara, 185, 189; and against .Vcadie, 
18.5. Succeeds Braddocic: Governor of the Bahamas, 
191. 
SpiiTRRirK, Commodore, With Colonel Kearney, at 

Monterey, 4a7. 
Shute, Governor, 1S6. 
Sibley, H. B., 593. 
Sickles, Daniel. 650. 
SiKYES, The Abbe, 380. 
SiGEL, General. 573, 691. 
Silk, Culture of, in Georgia, 100. 
SiLLiMAN, Gener«], At Hidgefield, 270. 
Silver, Bullet, containing Clinton's dispatch to Burgoyne, 

283. Coins, the first, in the United States, 122. 
Si.MCOE, Colonel, 339. 
Siouoi Indians. 31. 32. 

Six ^rations, Origin and History of the, 26. The Bwtish 
(lovernmeiit advises the colonies to secure the friend- 
ship of the, 183. Neutralitv of the, 192, 193. Their 
treaties of friendship, 199. 363. J()iii--rfmherst, 203. 
Sullivan's Exjiedilion against the, 30S, 304. 
Skenb. PniLip, 2".\ 
Skeiiesboroug'i, or Whitehall, 276. 

Slaves, The natives of America used as, by Columbus, 
41. Indians sold as, 74. Sold to the Virginia planters, 
ty the Dutch, 105. Commencement of negro slavery 
in South Carolma. 9S. Labor by, general in Georgia, 
174. In New Kngland and other colonies, 177. Slave- 
ships from Africa to Savannah, 174. In the United 
States, 371. Debates on slavery in Congress, 452. 
Charles Fenton Mercer's Resolution, declaring the 
slave-trade to be piracy, 593. The Ashburton treaty, 
respecting slave-trade, 472. Excluded from California, 
499. Keopening of, 635. 
Slemmer, Lieut., 580. 
Slidell, John, Confederate Commissioners, 585, 587. 

Returns to England. 5S9. 
Sloat, Commodore, Captures Monterey, 437. 
Slocum, H. W., General. 703. 
Slouqhter, Henry, Gi'vernor, 148. 
S.MiBERT, John, Ai-tist, Introduces portrait-painting 
in America, 158. 



S.MiLiE, John, Member of 
on the War of 1812, 409. 

Smith, A. J., 6S7. 

Smith, C. F., 596. 

Smith, E. Kirby, 632. 

Smith, John, Captain, 63. 
President of the Jamesto 



Committee of Congress, 



His voyage 
•n colony, 65. 



America 
Captured by 



Indians; saved by Pocahontas, 66. Remonstrates 
against gold-digging; leaves Jamestown in disgust. 
His explorations and travels, 67. Returns to England. 
68. His popularity with the Indians, 69. Employed 



r.Lli"7/'?.'2''"*l!.*^"'"P""'': captured by a FrencI, 
pirate 74. Offers his services to the Puritans, 77 Tha 

Notice 0.%"'" "^ '*'°- "'' History of Virginia, 65. 
Smith, .Ioskph, founds Mormon sect, 504. 
Smith, T. Kikby, 664. 

SMITH, Persifer F., General, at Contreras, 498 
SiUTir. Samuel, General, at Fort Mifflin, 275. Notice of, 

Smith, W. F , General, 692, 682. 
S .YTH, Alexander, General, 414 
t^nake Indians. 38. 
Snurre, the child of Gudrid.i, 35 
SoMERs, Sir George, 68. 

•• Somem,'' the, one of Commodore Perry's veaaels. 420 
.sonora. Colonel Fremont at, in 1846, 4S7. 
>io?ui of Liberty, political associations, 215. Of Massa- 
ehusetts, 23.3. Of New York. 24S. 
I SoTHEL, Seth, Governor, 165, 167 
j Southampton. Entdand, Puritans sail from, 77 
I bouth Carolina. Catawbas in, 27. Colony, 168. Occu- 
pied by the British, in 1780,813. Secession of, 546 
Quiet in, 672. 
South Mountain, battle of, 628. 
I South Uioer, or Delaware River, 94. 
South Sea, oriirin of the name, 42. 
South Virginia, 6;5, 68. 

Spain cedes the Floridas to England. 204. At war with 
England ; secret treaty of, with France, 306. Treatv 
of. with the United States, 381, 451. Difficulties with 
519. , ' 

Spaniards claim Port Royal, 166. Menace South Caro- 
lina settlements. 167. Moore's expedition against. 169 
Contests of, with Oglethorpe, 172. 
Spanish, voyages and discoveries, 36-45. 
Sj>ecie paymentti, suspended. 471. 
''Speedwell;' Puritan ship, 77, 115. 
•^I'l.^cKK, .losEi'H, General, 238, 289. 
Spottsylvania Court House, battle at, 689. 
Spaiqht,, Richard Dobbs, 356, 5;i4, 629. 
Spring, at Shawmut, 118. Williams's, at Providenoa. 

Rhode Island, 90. 
Springfield Indians,Vi'l. 
Sjiringfield, Connecticut, 86, 127. 
Springfield, New Jersey, skirmish at, 820, 821. 
S(,!La.nto, Indian Chief, 74, 114. 

Stamp Act. the, becomes a law, 218. Fate of, in Ameri- 
ca, 21.5. Repealed, 217. 
Stanton, Edwin, M., attempted removal of; 730. 
Standish, Miles, Captain. 78, 115. 
Stark-. John, General, 198,234, 277. 
Star-Spangled Banner, origin of the, 437. 
<>'<(>/cx. State Rights Doctrine, 463, 4M. Approve tha 

Slave System, 535, Disapprove it 536. 
State Bunks, the public funds distributed among the, 

470. 
Steele, General, 676. 036. 
Stephens, Alexander H., 54S. 
Stephens, Samuel, Governor, 9S 
Steuben, Baron, in Virginia, 333 

339. Notice of, 291. 
Stewart, Commodore, 440. 
Stewart, Colonel, at Orangebi 

Greene, 337, 338. 
Stevens, General, death of, 627. 
Stewart, J. K. B., General, 619, 690. 
Stirling, Lord, General. 144, 2-18, 254. 261. His skirmish 

with a corps under Cornwallis, 272. Notice of, 2M. 
Stirling, Colonel (British), 259. 
Stockbridge Indians, 187. 
Stockton, Robert F., Commodore, takes possession of 

Los Angelns; at San Gabriel, 487. Notice of, 487. 
STODEsr, Benjamin, first Secretary of the Navy, 882, 



Arrest of; 722. 
. Pursues Cornwallis, 

irg, 837. Pursued by 



Stoneman, General, 643. 

Stone, William, Governor, 152. 

Stonington, Commodore Hardy at, 437. 

Stono Indians, depredations by the. in the Carolina^ 

165. 
Stony Creek, skirmish at. 426. 
Stony Point, capture of, 297, 29a 
STi>u'GnT0N, Captain. 8S. 

Streets qf Philadelphia, origin of the name* of; Ifli 
Strkioht, a. D., Colonel, 662. 
Steicker. General, at Baltimore, 437. 

Strong, Caleb, 356. 
SlCRGis, General, 6S3. 



INDEX, 



Stutvesant, Peter, Governor, 93, 141, 142. Captures 
Swedish forts ; chastises the Esopus Indians, 143. 

Siib- Treaftury Scheme, 471, 475. 

Sugar Bill, the, 213. 

Sullivan, John, General, 238. At Brooklyn, 253. Pa- 
roled, 257. Succeeds General Charles Lee: joins 
Washington, 261. At Trenton, 262. At Brandywine, 
273. Supersedes General Spencer. 299. At the battle 
of Quaker Hill, 290. His expedition .airainst the Si.K 
Nations, 303, 304. At Tioga Point ; at Chemuns, 304. 

SUMNKR, General, 615, 621. 

i^ultan, the, Mary Fisher's mission to, 123. 

Sumner, Jetueo, General, 337. 

Sumter, Thomas, General, in South C.irolina, 314. On 
the Catawba; at Hanging Eock, 315. At Fishing 
Creek, 316. Returns to South Caroline, 1780, 319. 
The South Carolina Gamecock, 819. 

Sumter, Fort, fii'st gun fired at, 553. 

Susquehanna Indians, 17, 110. 

Stjtter, Captain, of California, gold discovered near the 
mill of, in 1S4S, 497. 

Swamey, King Philip attacks the men of Plymouth at, 
125. 

Swamp Angel, the, 674. 

Swedes seize Fort Casimir, 142. Subjugated by the 
Dutch, 143. In New Jersey and Pennsylvania, 62. 

Swedish Colony In America, 92. Fortresses, captured 
by Stuyvesant, 143. West India Company, 93. 

Swine, taken to America. 44; to Newfoundland aud 
Nova Scotia, 47, 58 ; to Virginia, 68. 

Sycamores, nt Providence, Khode Island, 90. 

SyjMmes,Cohn Cleves, 363. 

Syracuse, New York, great Council Fire at, 23. 



T. 

Tahaco, Tucatan, 70. 

Talladega, battle at, 423. 

" Ta/.ld/ois.see," ('<info(lerate privateer, 714. 

Tallii.^/'"/c/i,,. (;, lu-ral Coflfee at, 428. 

Tam<irn„., /„,/;.,„... 19. 

Tampn Ban, J-'"-' ^"to lands at, 44. 

Tampicn, Cajitured by Commodore Conner, 485. 

Taney, Kogek B., Chief Justice, Removes the Govern- 
ment funds from the United States Bank, 465. Ad- 
ministers the oath of office to President Van Buren, 
470; to President Harrison, 474; to President Taylor, 
499. Sketch of, 533. 

Tariff Bill, Of 1828, 459, 463, 464. Modifications of the, 
476, 477, 497. 

Tarleton, Colonel, Loss of his c.avalrv horses on Cape 
Hatteras, 809. Defeats Colonel Huger, 311. His 
slaughter of Buford's troops, 31-3. At Sanders's Creek, 
316. At Fishing Creek, 316. At the Cowpens, 331. 
Notice of, 316. 

Taxation, Without representation, is tyr.annv, 104, 16J5, 
211, 212. William Pitt's opinion of, 217. Views of in 
the Carolinas, 164, 165; and in Massachusetts, 219. 

Taylor, Bayard, Poem of, 557. 

Taylor, Dick, 677. 

Taylor, Zachaey, General, Succeeds General Jesup in 
the Seminole war, 468. His armv of occupation, 480. 
At Point Isabel. 481. Captures Miitamoras. 4S3. At 
Monterey, 484 ; Victoria, 485 ; Buena Vista, 486. Map 
of the region of his operations, 486. President of the 
United States, 1849, 490. Death of, 501. Notice of, 
498. 

Taylor, General, 622. 

Tea, Tax on by the British Government, 222. De- 
struction of at Boston, 225. 

Tecdmtha, 20,4(.8,411. Defeated by Colonel Miller, 411. 
Kouses the Southern tribes of Indians, 427. Death, 
425. Notice of, 424. 

Te Deum, The, Sung after victories and deliverances, 
265. 

Tennessee, Secession of, 547. Persecution of Union 
men, 575. Lost to Confederates, 598. In possession 
of the Union Army, 608. Events in, 661. Restored 
to the Union, 727. 

Tenure of Office, Bill o"", 729. 

Ternay, Admiral, His fleet at Newport, 321. His death, 
339. 

Terry, A. 11., Admiral, 713. 

Territory, Indian, Claimed by England, 17. Southwest 
of the Ohio, 372. Territorial Government of the 
United States, 362. " The Territories," 96. 

Teeeat, Retained by Spain, 451. Annexation of to the 



United States, 477, 478. State Constitution of, 479. 
Claims of, 499. Secession of, 547. Expedition for the 
recovery of, 678. 

Thames lii-ver, Connecticut, Discovered by Block, 72, 
87. Mohegan Indians on the, 21. 

Thames River, Canada, Battle on the, 424. 

Thanksgiving and Prayer, Congress recommends the 
appointment of a day for, 870. National, after the 
Peace of 1814, *44. 

Thayendanega : see Brant, Joseph. 

Thomas, George H., General, 594, 663, 665, 705. 

Thomas, John, General, 238. In Canada; Notice of, 
243. 

Thomas, Lorenzo, Appointed Secretary of War, 731. 

Tho.mpson Benjamin, Colonel, Count Rumford ; and 
notice of, 346. 

Thompson, Colonel, At Sullivan's Island, 249. 

Thompson, David, His colony of fishermen, 79. 

Thompson, M. Jeff , Guerilla Chief, 676. 

Thompson, Willey, General, His expedition to Florida, 
18.34, 466. Death of, 467. 

Thomson, Charles, Secretary of the Continental Con- 
gress ; Congress presents an urn to his wife, 228. 

Thornton, Captain, At the Rio Grande, 481, 4S2. 

Thoroughfare Gap, 625. 

Thuey, M., The Jesuit, 130. 

Ticonderoga, Samuel Champlain at, 59. Abercrombie's 
Expedition against, 196. Ruins of, 197. Captured by 
Allen and Arnold, 238. 

" Tigress," schooner, 420. 

Tinicum, Island, 93. 

Tippecanoe, Battle of, 408. 

Tobacco, Its use among the aboriginals, 14. Introduced 
into England, 70. A circulating medium in Virginia, 
105. -fames I. proposes to contract for the whole crop 
of, in Virginia, 107. Culture of, at Plymouth, 116. 

Tabasco, Cortez lands at, 43. Captured by Commodore 
Perry, 485. 

To-MO-cui-ciii, Creek Sachem ; his speech to Oglethorpe, 
103. 

Tompkins, Daniel D., Governor, 412. Vice-President 
of the United States : notice of, 4t6. 

Tonomy Hill, Rhode Island, 125. 

Torpedoes, 678. 

Tories, In the Carolinas, 309. The term Tory explained 
226. 

ToTTEN. Colonel, at Vera Cruz ; notice of, 489. 

Townshend, Charles, Chancellor of the Exchequer, 
218. 

Townshend, General, 201. At Quebec, 201-203. 

Treat, Robert, Governor, 156. 

Treaties, Indian, 362, 863. Treaty of peace between 
Great Britain and the United States, 448, 444, Treaty 
between Spain and the United States, 451. 

•^ Trent," British steamer. 

Trenton, New Jersey, Captured by Cornwallis, 260. 
Battle of, 262. 

Tri-Monntain, or Boston, 118. 

Tripartite 7'reati/, The, 513. 

Tripoli, The United States at war with, 39C, 391. De- 
catur at, 445. 

" Irippe," sloop, 420. 

Trist, Nicholas P., United States Commissioner to treat 
for peace with Mexico, 494. 

Troup, Governor, 456. 

Trumbull, Jonathan, notice of, 824. 

Teyon, Governor, 223. Driven from New York, 24S. 
At Compo, 270. Atrocities committed by, 270, 271. 
His marauding expeditions, 296. 

Tucker. President of the New Jersey Convention, 260. 

Tunis, The United States at war with, 1801, 890. De- 
catur at, 445. 

TuppER, General 416. 

Tuscarora Indians, 20, 23. Defeated by the Caroli- 
nians; Join the Five Nations, 25. Conspire against 
the North Carolina settlements, 168. 

Tuspan, captured by Commodore Peroy. 485. 

Twiggs, General, 483, 489. At Cerro Gordo, 489, 490. 
At St. Augustine, 493. Notice of, 498. 

Tyler, John, Vice-President of the United States, 473. 
Succeeds President Harrison ; Notice of, 475. 



UcMe Indians, their territorv and language, 12, 28. 
Uncas, Mohegan Chief; 87. His rumor against the Nar- 
ragansetts, 155. _ 



I X D i: X , 



TJnderhill, John, Captain, S7, 141. 

Union Flag, l-W. 

Unitarians, persecuted in Mai-yland, 82, 151. 

United States, Confederation, Articles of, 266, 267, 353, 
355. Constitution, 355. Mint, 373, 873. Post-office, 
373. Nav.v, origin of, 382. Commerce, 381, 382. Non- 
intercourse with Great Britain, 399. Injured by 
England and France, 400, 401, by pirates, 45i3. Bank, 
446. Oposed by President Jackson, 462, 465, 466. 
Oovernment in great danger, 627. Treaties with 
Great Britain, 848, 380, 443; France, 886; Russia, 469: 
Spain, 381; Belgium, 469; Mexico, 497; Algiers, 3S1; 
Tripoli.396. Seminole Indians, 468. "Wars :— Eno-land 
409; France, 885; Mexico, 480, 522; isrorocco 390- 
Tripoli and Tunis, 390; Algiers, 390. Cl.aiins of tlu-^ 
against France and Portugal, 468. Dispute of the, 
with Great Britain respecting Oregon, 405, 406, 479, 
480.. Exploring expeditions return to, 476. Indian 
population of, 32. 

United States, debt of, 678. Finances of, 678. Debt in 
1868, 734. 

" United States" frigate. 382,414,415. 

Utah, 499. Territory of, 537. 

Utrecht, Peace of, 136. 

V. 

Valencia, General, at Contreras, 493. 

Vallandioham, Clkment I, , C5(i. 71 1. 

Valley Forge, Washini:t<iii in wnittr quarters at, 284. 

Valparaiso, Naval action at, 431. 

Van iUREN, Martin, Secretary of State, 461. Vice- 
President of the United States, 464. President, 469. 
Notice of. 469. 

Van Uam, Kip, 158. 

Van Dop.n, Ma':i ii, Eiirl, 592. 

Vank, Henky, 86. Governor; favors Anne Hutchinson, 
120. 

Van Hornr, Major, 41 1. 

Van Kensselaer, Solo.mon, Colonel, 413. 

Van Rensselaer, Stkphen, General, commands the 
Army of the Centre, 412, 413. Notice of, 412. 

Van Rensselaer. Killian, 139. 

Van Twiller, Wouter, 139. 

Van- Wart, Isaac. 826. 

Var.nu.m, James M., General, 355. 

Vasco de Gam a, passes the Cape of Good Hope, in 37. 

VANnREiriL, Governor-General of Canada, 203. 

Valtgiian, John, General, burns Kingston, 2S3, 297. 

Velasquez, expeditions to Mexico, 43, 

Ver<i Cruz, its fortress; capture of, by General Scott, 489. 

Vergknnes, Count de, his dissatisfaction respecting the 
Treaty of Peace, 348. 

Vermont, added to the United States, in 1791, 371. 

VerplancKs Point, captuieof the fortress at, 297. 

Vbrazzanl John, his expedition to America, 47. 

Versche liiver, or Connecticut River, 82. 

Vesper Hymn, sung by Columbus and his crew, 39. 

Vespucius, A-mekioits, account of, 40, 41. Visits the 
"West Indies, and South America, 41. Discoveries bv, 
60. 

Vicksburg, 635, C42. Assault on, 645. Surrender of, 
646, 681. 

Victoria, General, 477. 

Villiers, M. de, 183. 

Vineenn*s, Captured, and re-captured, 1779, 303. 

'■'Viper'' brig, 414. , ^„ 

Virginia, Origin of the name of, 55. Capes of. 59. 
North. 63. South, 63, 68. First settlement of, 62. 
The colonists of, subdue the Shawnoesent Point Pleas- 
ant, 19. Lord De la "Warr, governor of. 68. Famine 
in, 69. Representative Assembly in, 71, 105. Tobacco 
a circulating medium in, 105. Opposes Cmmwell; 
invites Cliailes II. to be king of Virginia, 109. The 
Seneca Indians make war upon, 110. Response of the 
Burgesses of. to Jeffries, 113. Militia of, counties and 
parishes of, 114. Takes measures against the French, 
182, 1&3. Grant from Parliament to, 206. Lord Dun- 
more driven from, 243. The Virgina Plan, 359. Se- 
cession of, 547. 

" Vixen'' brig, 414. 
Volunteer", call for, 554. 
Voyages and Discoveries, Spanish, 36-45. 

*• Vulture" sloop-of-war, 326. 



Wadswobtu, Captain, 156, 157. 



Wadsworth, General, killed, 689. 

Waldron. Major. Death of, 130. 

Walker, Governor, 165. 

Walker, Sir IIoveni>en, at Boston, 136. 

"Walker, "W'illiam, Colonel, his military operations, 523, 

Walker, Captidn, of IheTexan Rangers, 481, 482. 

Wallai^ e, S I r J a m es, 223. 

Wallace, Lewis. General, 590, 633, 695. 

Walla- Walla River. Battle at the, 528. 

Walloons, arrive at Manhattan, in 73. 

Walnut Springs, 484. 

Walpole, Robert, 213. 

Walton, Gkoriie. in Convention on the Articles of 
Confederation. 356. 

Wampanoay Indians. 22, 114, 124. 

Wanchese, Indian chief, 55. 

TTar, of the Spanish Succession. 235. Of the Austrlaa 
Succession, 137. See United States. 

War Civil, end of, 553. 721. 

Ward, Ap.temas, General, in the French and Indian 
War, 198. His api)ointment as General, 230, 234, 238. 
At Boston, 239. Enters Boston, alter its evacuation, 
247 

Warner, Seth, Colonel, 234. 240, 176, 277. 
j Warren,Josepii, Dr.. 232.233. 

Warren, Admiral. 137, 138, 191. 

Warren, General, 660. 
' Warwick, Earl of. 85. 
I War7cici: l:i....le Island, burned, 127. 
j Washburnuene, C. C, General, 678. 

Washington City, burned by General Ross. 1814, 436. 
I The Seat of Government of the United States, 3SS. 
Addition made to the Capitol at. 509. In great dan- 
ger, 558. Plans for the capture of, 623. In great 
peril, 625. 

Washington, George, Bearer of Governor Dinwiddle's 
letter to M. St. Pierre, ISl. Colonel Fry's Lieutenant, 
in the French and Indian War, 182. .\t Great Mead- 
ows, 183. Resigns his Oonimission, 1&4. Braddock's 
Aid, in the battle of Monongahcla; his wonderfii( 
escape from death, ISO. With tSeneral Forbes against 
Fort Du Quesne, 198. 
I Commander-in-chief at 

Cambridse, 238. Causes the Declaratien of Indapen- 
dence to be read to each of his brigades, 252. His return 
I from Long Island, 254, 257. At Ilarlem Heights. 257. 
Exposure at Kip's bay, at the house of Roger Morris, 
259. Crosses the Delaware, 260. Captures Hessians 
at Trenton ; invested with the power of Military dicta- 
torship, 2&4. Ills victory at Princeton, 268. Opinion of 
his exploits in New Jersey, expressed by Frederic of 
Prussia, 269. Perplexed by Howe; his first interview 
with La Fayette, 272. Crosses the Scbnylkill, 274. At 
White Marsh. 283. Pursues Clinton at White Plains, 
Middlebrook, 288. Disap])roves of a proposed invasion 
of ?anada, 294. At Valley Forge, 274, 284. Schemo 
for superseding him, 235. At Monmouth, 287. Called 
by the Indians, '• Town Destroyer;" Cornplanter's Ad- 
dress to, .304. In winter quarters at Morristown. 806. 
Fits out armed vessels at Boston, 807. Lleutenant- 
General of the French empire ; his first interview with 
Rochambe.iu, 323. Reprimands Arnold, 325. Proposes 
to attack New York, 339. Writes deceptive letters to 
Gener.al Greene, at Torktown, 840. 341. At New 
York, after the cai)ture of Cornwalli.s, 346. Suppresses 
the general discontent in the army, 849. Quells the 
mutiny of the Pennsvlvania troops. 850. Nicola's let- 
ter to him, 349. His Farewell Address to his coui- 
p.anions in arms, 850. and His farewell to his officers, 
351,852. Resigns his commission; President of tb* 
Cincinnati Society. 352. President of the Convention 
to revise the Articles of Confederation, 856. Presiden', 
of the United States; his administration 364. His 
journey to New York, 364, 365. Takes the oath of 
office, 366. His tour through the northern and eastern 
States, 1789,370. His Farewell Address to his country- 
men, 382. Retires to Mount Vernon, 383. Death of, 
386, 3S7. Lee's Funeral Oration on, 887. Bonaparte's 
tri'uute to, 3s7, 388. Tribute to, by the British fleet, 
888. 

Washington, Martha, notice of, 886. 

Washington, William Acoustink, Colonel, 384. No- 
tice of, •<32. 
Wi'shin^ton Territori/, 480,513. 

" Wasp:' sloop. 414. 415. 440. 

Watson, Colonel, on the Pedee, 820. 
Wciter/ord, Henry Hudson at, 59. 



lii 



Wayne, GeReral. Surprised hy r.pneral Gray, 274. Re- 
strains a meeting of Pennsylvania troops, 828. Pursues 
Comwallifi, 339. At Savannah, 346. His Expedition 
against the Indians, 374. Crushes an Indian Confede- 
racy, 21. Notice of, 298. 

Webb, General. 194. 

Webster, Daniel, Secretary of State, 474, 502. His 
negotiation with Lord Ashbnrton, 472. 

Webster, Fletouer, Announces the death of President 
Harrison, 475. 

Webster, Licntenant-Colonel, 834. 

Webster, Caritiiin, at Saltillo, 4S6. 

Weitzel, Godfrey, General, 713. Entered Eichmond, 
718. 

" Welcome." ship, 96. 

Wellington, Lord, enters Paris, 4-31. 

Wells, Colonel, one of chief leaders against the savages, 

416. 
Welsh Indians, 32. 

Wkeyss, Major, at the Broad River, 319. 
Weroicoronocco, Virginia, 66. 

Wesley, John, Rev., in Georgia, 171. 

West Joseph, his colony, 9S. 

Westchester, New York, General Knyphausen at, 259. 

Wettern Virr/ina, admitted as a State, 561. Struggle 
to get i>ossesslon of, 578. Close of Canapaign in, 579 
660. 

West Indies, The, Voyages of Columbus and Vespucius 
to. 40, 41. Trade of, 367. 

West Jersey, Remarkable law enacted by the Assembly 

of, 160. 
Weston^s Colony/, 115. 

West Point, New York, Arnold appointed to the com- 
mand of. 325. 

Weymouth George, Captain, 58. 

Weymouth, Massachusetts, burned, 127. 

Whalehoiit Warfare, 308. 

Whalley, Ei>ward, Regicide Judge, 123. 

Wheeler. Captain, 126. 

WiiEELOcK, Rev. Dr., his School at Lebanon, 25. 

Wheelwrioiit, John, Rev., founds Exeter, 80. Favors 
the religious views of Mrs. Hutchinson, 120. 

Whig and Tory, explanation of the terms, 226. 

Whipple Arrauam, Commodore, 223. His flotilla, 
notice of, 310. 

Whisky Insurrection, The, P7S. 

White, John, Governor, 56, 57. 

White, Peregrine, the first English child born in New 
England, 78. 

While, Colonel, on the Santee River, 311. 

WniTKFiELD, George, Rev., in Georgia, 171. 

White Plains, New York, Washington at, 258. 

Wife, price of a, in Virginia, in 1620, 105, 

Wilderness, T!ie, 689. Battle of, 690. 

Wilkes, Commodore, his Expedition, 476, 477. Takes 
Mason and Slidell prisoners, 587. 

Wilkinson, James, General, sent by Gates with a 
verbal message to Congress, 282. His Expedition 
against the Indians, 374. Burr's associate, 396. With 
General Dearborn, 810. Succeeds Dearborn ; his 
operations, 426. At Prcscott, 426, 427. At. St. Regis ; 
at French Mills, 427. At Plattsburg, 432. Notice oi, 
426. 

WiLLETT, Colonel, 278. 

William IIL, and Mary, accession of. 180, 148. Their 
war with France, 130. William prohibits printing in 
the American colonies, 153. Interested in Captain 
Kidd's Expedition, 149. 

William and Mary College, 178. 

Williams David, cue of the captors of Andr6, 826. 

Williams, Epuraim, Colonel, death of, 190. 

Williams, James, Colonel, at King's Mountain, 319. 

Williams, John, Rev., captured by Indians: fate of his 
wife, 135. 

Williams, Otho H., Colonel, 318. 

Williams, Roger, 87,158. Founder of Rhode Island, 
89,119, Persecuted, 119. Pacifies hostile Indians at 
New Netherland, 141. Notice of, 89. 

Williani's College, founded, 190. 

Williams's Spring, 90. 

Williamslntrg, Virginia, 111. Battle of, 616. 

WiLLMOT, Captain, death of, 848. 

Wilson James, in Convention on the Articles of Con- 
federation, 356, 859. Judge of the Supreme Court of 
the United States, 869. 



Wilson, Rev. Mr., Saltonstall's letter to, 118. 

Wilson, Robert, Ensign, 342. 

Wilson'^s Creek, battle at, 574. 

Wittwyck, Indians massacre the inhabitants of. 148. 

Winchester, General, 416,417. Notice of, 418. 

Winder, General, 426. At Bladensburg, 436. 

WiNGFiELD, Edward M., His conduct toward Captaii* 
John Smith ; deposed, 65. 

Winnehdfjo /rtr/i»as considre .against the English,205. 

WiNSLdW. Edward, Governor, "85, 185. Received by 
Massasoit, 114. Cows and a bull imported by, 116. 
His letter to Governor Winthrop, 142. 

WiNSLOW, John A. Captain of the Kearsage, 708. 

WiNSLOw, John, General, 1S5, 191. 

Winston, Joseph. Colonel, at King's Mountain, 819. 

Winter, severe, of 1777-1 77S, 284. 

Winthrop, John, Governor, 117, 118. His expedition 
against Canada, 131. Applies to Charles II. for a new- 
charter, 155. Indian chiefs at the table of, 118. No- 
tice of, 118. 

Wini/aw Hay, La Fayette lands on the shore of, 273. 

Wisconsin, admitted to the Union in 1818, 497. 

Wise, Henry A , 539 56 . 

Wi.ssagusset Settlement, 115, 116. 

Witchcraft, in Massachusetts, 132, 133. 

Wolfe, James, General, 196, 199, 200. At Quebec, 201. 
Death of; monument to, 202. 

WaJfe's Cove, 202,241. 

Wolfe's Ravine, 202. 

Women, Indian, condition of, 14, 15. The first two on 
the James River, 67. A hundred and fifty, become 
wives of Virginia planters, 71. No white, in Virginia, 
in 1619; ninety sent by Sandys, in 1620; sixty, sent, 
in 1621, 105. (See Wife.) 

Woodford, General, 244, 311. 

Woodhull, Nathaniel, General, 198, 254. 

Wool. John Enlis, General, 418. At Monclova; at 
Parnas. 484. At Braceti, 483. At Saltillo, 489. No- 
tice of, 4S4, 526, 617 

Wool Means used to prevent the scarcity of, in Amer- 
ica, 216. 

Wooi.SEY, Captain, 4.32. 

WoosTEK, David, General, 238, 243, 271. 

Worden, .John L. Lieut, 672. 

Worth, William J., General, at Monterey, 483. At 
Saltillo, 484. At the Castle of Perote, 490. At Mex- 
ico, 494. Notice of, 498. 

Writs of Assistance, 212. 

Wyandot Indians, 23, 24. Cede their lands to the 
United States. 24. Con.spire against the English, 1763, 
205. Treaty with the, 863. 

Wyandot County invaded by the Five Nations, 24. 

Wyatt, Sir Francis, 106, 108. 

Wyiming Valley, devastation of, in 1778, 290, 291. 

Wythe, Gboegb, in Convention on the Articles of 
Confederation, 356. 



Yale, Elisha, Benefactor of Yale College, 173. 

Yale College, 153, 178. 

Yamacraw Bluff, 100, 103. 

Yamasee Indians, 30, 168, 170. 

Yankee Doodle, the National Song, 220. 

Yates, Robebt. in Convention on Articles of Confed- 
eration, 356. 

Yazoo City, 683. 

Yazoo River, De Soto on the banks of the, 44. 

Yeamens, Sir John, 98. 

Yeardley, Geokor, Governor, 70, 107. His Represent- 
ative Assembly. 105 

Yeo, Sir James, 4-32. 

York, Duke of, 94. His American possessions, 129. 
Sells New Jersey, 159. 

Yorktown, Virginia, fortified by Cornwallis, 840. Sur- 
render of, 341, 342, 345. 

Youngstown burnt, 427. 

z. 

Zenger, John Peter, Editor of the New York Weekly 

Journal, arrested, 150. 
ZoLLiooFFER, Felix K", 575. 577. 596» 



SUPPLEMENTARY INDEX. 



Alabama Claims, how settled, 740. 
Amnesty Bill, 737. 
Apportionment, a new, 741. 

Arthxtb, Chester A., inaugurated President of the 
U. S.; Inaugural Address of, 758. 



Boston, Great Fire in, 739. 



Centennial Exhibition, History of the, 746. 

Chicago, Great Fire in, 739. 

Commission, Joint High, 740. 

Congress, Extraordinary Session of; Special Session 
of, 751. 

CoNKLiNG, RoscoE, opposes the President's Nomina- 
tions; Resigns his seat in the Senate; Vainly seeks 
a reappointment, 755. 

Constitution, Amendment of, to secure the Right of 
Suffrage to Women, proposed, 752. 

Cuba, Trouble with, 738. 

Custer, Destruction of Command of, 744. 

D. 
Darien, Isthmus of. Proposed Canal across the, 739. 



Electoral Commission, 749. 
Embassy from Japan, 742. 

F. 

Fenian Brotherhood, Raid of the, 738. 
Franking Privilege abolished, 742. 
Funding Bill proposed, 753. 

G. 

Garphtld, James Abram, chosen President of the 
United States; Inauguration of; Cabinet of, 754; 
Shot by an assassin, 755; Death of; History of the 
sad event, 756; Funeral Obsequies of, at Washing- 
ton and Cleveland, 760. 

Grand Duke Alexis, visit of, 742. 

Grant, Ulysses S., Message of, on Reorganization, 
737; Re-elected President of the United States, 740; 
Inauguration of; Cabinet of, 743. 

Greenback Party, 752. 



Hates, Rutherford B., elected President of th« 
United States; Cabinet of, 750. 

Indian Policy, the, 742. 
Indian Reservations, 743. 

Inter- Oceanic Canal and Lesseps; Hayes's Message on 
the subject, 752. 

J. 
Japan, Embassy from, 742. 
Joint High Commission, 740. 

N. 
National Nominating Conventions and their Nomin- 
ees, 752. 
Negro Exodus, 751. 
Nez Perces, War with the, 744. 



Pacific Railway completed, 737. 

Presidency of tlm United States, Nominations for th« 

741. 
Presidential Election in 1876, 749. 
Public DM at the close of 1880, 753. 



Reorganization, Message of President Grant on; of 
the Union Flag, 737. 



Santo Domingo, Proposed Annexation of, 738. 
Sioux Indians, Interference and War with, 743. 
Specie Payment, Resumption of, provided for, 742; 

Resumption of; Effects of Resumption, 757. 
Southern States, Feeling in, 743. 

T. 
Treaties with Foreign Nations in 1881, 755. 

U. 
Union Flag, Reorganization of, 737. 
Ute Indians, Trouble with the, 752. 

W. 
Weather Signals established, 741. 
Wilson, Henry, elected Vice-President of the United 
States, 742. 



